First of all I'd like to say I'm sorry for how the blog has been run recently, I've been busy dealing with a lot of stuff going on in my life right now, and I assume Cecilie is too busy snogging her new borfreind. At the moment I'm the UK, and while Chris is at school, I have for the first time, in a really long time, felt like I had time and energy to write a blog. And I had a lot on my mind, so I guess it's just writing it, here you go:
Recently I read Esther Earl’s book,
if you’re not familiar with who she is; she’s a nerdfighter who else from
fighting for nerddom also fought cancer. In 2010 she sadly lost her fight, but
not before having helped a lot of people through charities and her general
awesomeness.
There’s a lot of interesting things
in Esther’s book, her courage, positivity and ability to be love is very inspiring,
and the book can really make you as the reader put things into perspective.
Anywho what the book inspired me to write about was ‘internet-friendships’, because when Esther fought her brave
fight, she needed somewhere to go, and that place ended up being Nerdfighteria.
And though my story is nowhere near as inspiring or tragic as Esther’s, I was
about the same age she was when I started searching a community to fit in.
I was going through a hard time in
my life, my family was slightly falling apart, a long story there - one I don’t
feel like talking about yet - all I feel like saying is that depression can
ruin a family. At the same time I didn’t have an awful lot of friends, and the
only one I knew was there for me was Cecilie, and I didn’t really fit in at my
school - I was never bullied, I just didn’t fit in. It was a stressful time for
me, and I’d often find myself crying or feeling down, and I needed somewhere to
go, somewhere I could meet people who were like me, or at least would accept me
for who I am. And like Esther found John
and Hank Green’s world of nerdfighters, I found Rhett and Link’s Kommunity (all
of these people are ‘youtubers’).
This was all about three years ago
when I was 15/16 years old, I found the Kommunity through Youtube and when I
mustered the courage I started talking to people on the site, I don’t remember
what I said or how long I stared at the screen before I wrote something in the
chat (probably a really long time!), but I remember the first person I talked
to, she was a Dutch girl named Femkie, slowly but surely a group of people who
were all about the same age got together. Quite a few people from the US, and a
few from Europe, all in all we were maybe ten people. We were rarely all “together”,
but usually at least five or six of us would chat every night, and on the
weekends we would have group calls on Skype. I believe I introduced Cecilie to
all of these people at one point, though she never fit in as well with them as
I did, she found some people that she
liked better, understandably so, our bunch was a mental group of people
admittedly.
I felt good “around these people”, I
could be myself and we could talk about anything, it could be about silly made
up cereal brands, or trouble at home or in school. We just felt completely
comfortable with each other. Sadly after a while we stopped talking as much, we
would chat every few months, but we weren’t as close, though whenever one of us
did write we’d always be greeted with open arms and hearts. We slightly grew
apart, we each had our own lives, I graduated from one school and started at
another, I got a lot of new friends, and slightly forgot to talk to the people
who helped me through so much. This group of people helped me find myself and
like myself.
Then one day, after about a year, a
message popped up on my Skype “Long time no Sidsel” it read, and this terrible
pun got me and Chris talking again, soon, within days we agreed that we might
want to be more than friends. We talked every day and after little less than
four months, we met. As we held each other in the airport I felt so at home, in
the arms of a person I’d never met before. We knew each other so well, and I’ve
never been that close with anyone.
A few months back another message
popped up on Skype, this time in a group chat I’d long forgotten, and the
message did declare the chat dead - which it then turned out it wasn’t we spend
hours that night talking about everything and nothing; about school, sexuality,
family, celebrities and stupid puns. We talk a little, every once in a while
now, and we’re not as close as we used to be, but we’re still pretty close and
open about everything.
And why am I telling you this? I don’t
really know, I just felt like sharing. But I think it’s interesting how close
and open I could be with this group of people I’d never met before. And I think
it’s a general thing with people you meet on the internet, you’re more able to
open up, and you get to know each other’s personalities. When you meet someone
in real life you’re affected by their looks, the way they dress and all that
stuff, whereas on the internet you get affected by how people “act” when you
talk, and you get to know them.
Of course there’s the danger of
people only letting you know what they want you to know about them, and that
way it can be easier to lie or even hide behind a fake identity, and this
happens, and sadly it gives internet friendships a bad rep, I’m very aware that
not all parents will let their teenage daughters internet boyfriend visit for a
week - luckily my parents are very open minded.
I truly, honestly believe that you
can be more open, more yourself on the internet, and maybe if you’re lucky you
can have so close a friendship that you can be equally open with these people
in real life. When I’m with Chris, I’m more myself than I ever am, sometimes I’m
even more myself with him than I am when I’m alone.
I’m so thankful that the internet
allowed me to meet a person who’ll stay up all night talking, who’ll hold me
when I need it, who’ll cuddle up around me when I curl up in sadness. I’m so
glad I’ve met someone who I can (and have spent months to) tell everything
about me, and who’ll still love my unconditionally.
And sure, if I hadn’t met my perfect
guy on the internet, I would’ve met someone else, somewhere else, but it would
never have been the same.
As John Green says it:
“I
dislike the phrase “Internet friends,” because it implies that people you know
online aren’t really your friends, that somehow the friendship is less real or
meaningful to you because it happens through Skype or text messages. The
measure of a friendship is not it’s physicality but its significance. Good
friendships, online or off, urge us toward empathy; they give us comfort and
also pull us out of the prisons of ourselves.”
Okay, after having written you this
essay (wauw, has anyone even made it this far?), I’ll leave you to it. Hopefully
you have someone there for you, online or off.
Baiiiiii!
-Sidsel
