None of you is real
Apparently there’s a distinction between real friends, and internet friends. I am therefore expecting some sort of cosmic imbalance to occur on Saturday when I officially move in with Pete, who introduced himself to me, just over a year ago, by his domain name. He is not real; he is only internet.
I’m not ashamed that I met my boyfriend through blogging, but I rarely volunteer the information to the uninitiated, who would be unable to understand. It’s just too much hard work to explain the unconventional to someone whose social life is limited to smoky pubs and wherever else it is that real people meet each other.
I ever-so-slightly prefer my internet friends, anyway. Real people are hard work. They find html party invitations unwelcoming and strange, and they don’t check their email regularly. How is one supposed to communicate with them?
I don't suppose Dad ever mentions that he met his wife via a newspaper small ad (I wonder, for that matter, if their offspring knows...).
Does a friend you met on the steps of the Hammersmith Polish Centre count?
Sorry, these distinctions are confusing me.
Doctor Pockless (Revisited) · February 25, 2004 16:39I'm wondering how it's going to work at my party when blogger friends meet non blogging friends. I see conversations going
NonBlogger> Hi I'm Bob
Blogger> Bob of ???
NB> Bob Smith
B> Of ???
NB> Birmingham
B> No whats your URL
NB> My What
B> Your URL
NB> Are you being rude?
B> Oh your one of those friends, never mind.
Although thats assuming loads of bloggers turn up. Which I'm not so sure will happen.
Sill most 'real' people just consider me weird so I can get away with most things.
"Blogging, it's the new black"
Adrian · February 25, 2004 17:08I've been saying this to my real friends for years.
My imaginary real friends that is...
D · February 25, 2004 17:29I only have imaginary Internet friends.
Doctor Pockless (Revisited) · February 25, 2004 18:03I used to work in Hammersmith and can confirm that its polish is great stuff. Our woodwork has never looked as good since our office relocated to Surrey.
Hg · February 25, 2004 21:17I actually live in mortal fear of the moment when my internet friends meet my real friends. Fortunately, it's getting better over the years since I only have six real friends, and many of the internet friends are far too far away to ever be in danger of coming into contact with them.
Vaughan · February 25, 2004 22:40this is why my life is so hard to explain to people.
kate · February 25, 2004 23:34Woohoo! Good for you! I met my (soon to be) fiance through the internet, and believe it or not, we are not both trolls! Who woulda thought??
I don't offer much information to my real friends about how I met my man, cause people just can't grasp how we could 'really' be a couple. The bridge to internet boyfriend to real boyfriend was a scary one, but we did it. I never would have met him otherwise, so thank god for internet friends.
Ali · February 25, 2004 23:37The worst is explaining to the _zine_ friends (who came first) that you've changed your name. "Actually, it's Daniella Easy Tiger now. No, not married...I just started a blog."
Dani · February 26, 2004 02:13I think that the uninitiated do understand, but just think it's strange, which it is.
I've nixed all of my online relationships b/c they never seemed real and I couldn't deal with the secrets anymore. They were nothing but illusions as far as I'm concerned.
So, I'm much happer out there in the real world, in smokey pubs, meeting face to face with real people. It seems hardly limited.
Pub Dweller · February 26, 2004 04:15I don't mind not being real. I like that I can come here and have a not real cocktail or cup of tea. Happy moving day with your not real boyfriend and if, as he become real, the world ends on Saturday, I'll know which not real person to blame!
Karan · February 26, 2004 05:11A real friend of mine married and has twins with someone who e-mailed her. At the time (about three years ago) we (her real friends) thought it rather strange and a receipe for disaster. They lived on different continents, for a start, and had only met each other "really" a few times before they got engaged.
They're still together, on the same continent and in the same country most of the time, blissfully happy and the twins are gorgous.
I know quite a few people who met through magazine ads. They and the internet are just the twenty-first century equivalent of walking over the hill to the next village.
qB · February 26, 2004 09:15Nah.
Just fate's way of being lazy.
Stuart · February 26, 2004 10:31So has it gone too far when you meet another blogger and wear a t-shirt with your URL on it?
And when the other blogger starts trying to 'click' the URL... too far again?
Hypothetically of course...
Gordon · February 26, 2004 16:48When questioned about this by my Real friends, I get very Zen-like and tell them that the 'real' world is only an illusion.
Lux · February 26, 2004 17:42Grins sheepish(ly?)
Knows how 'internet' can fade in and out of 'real'. But whatever it is or becomes, it does leave a lasting impression...
Gek · February 26, 2004 20:43Cheerio and such for saturday karen :D.
(and don't forget your 'real' friends :P)
Here's the confession. The 'public' story is we met when I went on a trip to Italy by myself.
jo · February 27, 2004 14:37The 'real' story is we met on the internet. Continents apart. We married, he moved, 6 years in May.
Blissfully happy. Love is where you find it.
I think my Internet friends know me far better than my "real" friends do. I can't get a word in edgewise with my "real" friends, but here, I make myself known. So, I guess that means that, in the "real" world, they're real and I'm not; but on the Internet, I am real, even though "they" may not be?
manicat · February 29, 2004 02:26