Up late and can't sleep

. . . so thought I'd sign on and post a few thoughts.

It's funny how you get attached to people you've never met.

Over the years I've been active online, I've developed some unique relationships with people from across the globe. A few have come and gone, much like face to face relationships. You meet, you exchange niceties, exchange information, maybe spend time together, but you eventually move on in your respective lives. Just another part of life's experiences.

Yet, I wonder about the individuals that I made a connection with on the 'net, no matter how brief. I wonder about Susan in New York who gave me a great recipe for Zuppe de Pesce that I still use and the person who introduced me to the writing of George Gissing. I wonder what happened to the guy who helped me through debugging my first internet virus. I wonder about the early members of TBF like Holger and Tobytook and Dawn. Do they still remember me as I remember them? I guess we were just ships passing in the night -- to see each other from a distance, perhaps exchange messages, but ultimately continue on our respective journeys, never to be seen or heard from again.

Sad, in a way, but still part of my totality, so I guess it's okay.

Comments

Anonymous said…
I'm not very good at connecting with people so I can't really play along here. :-)

Happy New Year, Ell. Hope it becomes a great year for you.
December 31, 2005 6:46 am
Anonymous said…
i haven't been an onliner long enough to develop nostalgia about people, well there is that one tbf'er, hollis, who was from texas and was pregnant, i wonder how her labour went and if she had a boy or a girl.
December 31, 2005 8:14 am
Anonymous said…
I have met some amazing people online. Many have touched me deeply.

Wishing you and yours the happiest of New Years.
January 01, 2006 9:51 am
Anonymous said…
What's TBF?

I have met some people online that I met later on in real life and some who stayed cyber-friends. I first got online around 1994, I think, so I do have nostalgia and curiosity about several of them. Being single, there were flirtations with some from the personals. I don't do that anymore but do wonder about some of them.
January 02, 2006 10:33 am
Anonymous said…
TBF is short for The Book Forum - an online book forum that I've been a member of since 2001 and where I was a moderator until a few months ago.
January 02, 2006 3:17 pm
Anonymous said…
Ah, thank you. That would help explain why you did so well on my book quiz. It does sound interesting.
January 02, 2006 10:32 pm
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Sunday Scribblings: A Rome Walk

Image
or "Are you sure we turn here?" There's something exciting about not quite knowing where you're going. For the sake of this prompt, I'm talking about walks, but it could apply to life in general. This prompt has also given me the opportunity to revisit my trip to Rome taken almost exactly one year ago . It's not that I don't know where I'm going, it's just that I'm not quite sure how to get there. I'd spent months prior to our trip armed with a multitude of maps and guides and had a pretty good mental map of central Rome. Or so I thought. Funny how places aren't quite the same when you actually get there. We were leaving Castel Sant'Angelo where we'd spent the last two hours combing the dark and slightly creepy stone corridors and surveying the expanse of Rome from the parapets. It was nearing twilight and we wanted to see the Trevi Fountain before searching out a place for dinner. So, out we head into darkening Rome. I...
Read more

My Nights

If left to my own devices – no job or early morning commitments – I'd be up most nights until dawn. I'm a night person. I like the solitude. I like the stillness. I like the wrap-around black coziness and the inky-black eeriness; the disconnectedness that sometimes leads to hidden and surprising insights to my soul. Perhaps, these insights were there all along, submerged below the surface of my daytime consciousness – unable to break through because of the noise and clutter of everyday life. I don't know. What I do know is that those niggling, back of the brain feelings ignored during the day because I'm too busy or too pre-occupied, break out full blown at night. The solution to problems, so unanswerable during the day, becomes obvious and self-evident at night. Thoughts and feelings, long ago forgotten become unforgotten. At night, all things seem possible. The line between reality and dream; conscious and sub-conscious thin and fade in those late-night hou...
Read more

For those who sneer at blogging . . .

You know who you are. I must admit I didn't know what would happen when I started blogging. I entered the blogosphere with a bit of trepidation. (See my original blog in November '05). Is it just a place for angst-ridden, navel-gazing? Maybe a place to promote ideology, to advertise a new product or gimmick, a quasi chat room for friends and family? You'll find all these, and more in the Land of Blog. You'll also find well-written, thoughtful articles on all manner of subjects . . . and you'll find poorly-written, spelling-challenged juvenile drivel (but these you'd find anywhere online). It's the good stuff that has me intrigued. And there's a lot more of the good than I had expected. There seem to be a lot of writers in blogland. Yes, I know everyone 'writes' in a blog. I don't mean people who just put up their daily schedule or hockey team stats. By 'writer' I mean those whose purpose is to present ideas, inner questi...
Read more