Trying to explain to my father how I know some people is often a struggle. Even more so when it’s people I’ve met off of the internet.
My friend Sam and I trained together at university but you can guarantee if I say to my dad “I’m seeing Sam tomorrow,” he’ll say “who’s Sam and where did you meet him?” When I point out who Sam is or if dad see’s her he remembers her instantly. Sadly he remember her by saying “Oh yeah, the blonde with the big moggies!” Moggies was my nan’s word for boobies!
If I say to him “I spoke to Dave last night,” he replies with “Which one is Dave again?” and the conversation continues along the lines of meeting Dave while working for a radio station but this itself brings more questions as he tries to work out which station it was and which Dave I’m talking about.
So I try to be very careful when explaining to him who I’ve been speaking to so as to try and limit the questions I’ll get asked so that I can actually get to the point of the conversation. If he asks too many questions I forget why I’m telling him I spoke to them in the first place!
You can imagine then the problems I have when trying to explain about the friends I’ve met off of the internet.
Trying to explain that I’m meeting up with people from a social networking site or a forum is incredibly difficult as he wants to know exactly how I got to know these people.
This though is the nature of friendships now. With the world getting smaller via the internet and friendships being made on an international level, having friends we’ve never met is something we’re going to have to get used to.
There are people I’ve met up with after meeting them through blogging or social forums that I’d now consider some of my closest friends. I’d go so far as to say I love them. In the same light there are some I haven’t met for real, only online, but I feel just as strongly for them as well.
My first real experience of this was using an AOL chat room. I got chatting to a girl called Adele. Adele Clee or ASClee as her screenname said. We would chat in the room or in an IM for hours about all sorts of rubbish. She told me all about the guy she was marrying and I told her all about my current beau and we compared notes and exchanged pictures. Strangely enough we never exchanged pictures of each other, just of our partners!
One Thursday night she told me she wouldn’t be about for a month or so but would email me. This was because she was getting married on Saturday and then off on her honey moon. She told me where she was getting married and I said I only lived round the corner. A small lie as it was at least a thirty minute drive away but I knew the area she was on about.
Then, totally out of the blue, she invited me and my other had to her wedding! A person I’d never met was now inviting me to her wedding! This was all very strange given that I didn’t know what she looked like. I didn’t accept outright but said I’d chat with Nick and see what we were doing. She understood.
So that night I explained to Nick about the wedding. He already knew who Adele was and had spoken to her a couple of times online himself. We talked about the idea of it and in the end decided to go.
As fate would have it traffic conspired against us and we arrived at the church more than halfway through the ceremony with a rapidly purchased gift in hand. The whole issue of a gift had bought more questions! How much do you spend on someone you’ve never met?
We decided not to go in and instead waited for them to come out. When they did we just stood in the corner of the church yard and waited until most people had said their congratulations.
Walking up to the bride I suddenly realised that I could actually be at the wrong church. Keep in mind I had no idea what she looked like, or her new husband or any of the guest and she didn’t know me either. It was the summer and most churches would have a wedding on the Saturday. This could be anybody!
Hesitantly I approached with a smile, caught her eye and just said “Adele?” She nodded and replied “Landers?” (and yes, she actually did as my screenname was my nickname which is the same as it is now!).
We hugged, chatted and explained, in truth, how we couldn’t actually stay long as Nick had been called in to work that afternoon.
After some pictures we said our goodbyes then Nick and I enjoyed and champagne and strawberries on the village green.
I never spoke to her again in any form of communication and I couldn’t tell you why.
That same year I went to my first “meet” in a hotel in Blackpool where I ended up being the entertainment (a whole other blog entry) and meeting people I still chat with and care for very much. People who up until six months before the meet I couldn’t tell you anything about.
With the introduction of Facebook, Twitter, linkedin, Last.fm, blip and all the other micro-blogging or social networking sites my circle of friends has grown bigger and bigger and I’d say I was lucky if I’d met 10% of the people I chat to on a regular basis. People I call friends.
I wonder how long it will be before people are only making friends with those they’ve never met? Although it makes for an incredible international community I also think it’s quite sad future, if that’s how it’s going to pan out. I hope it’s not something I’m a part of but I know, as I sit here and write a blog entry I’m going to tweet about, that I’m helping to make the world smaller and friendship that little bit more impersonal.
