In real life
I always say I have no writer friends in real life. Problem is, my online life is a big part of the very real life that I live, so I guess I’ve been misrepresenting myself – and my friends. The internet is the way that I meet other writers. It’s the way we connect on literary and other matters. It’s where we turn for a quick word of encouragement or…a quick word.
Click, IM…”Hey, Angie, what’s a better word for bad than bad? Oh and can you read my first chapter? Yeah, uh now?”
Click, compose…”Hi Debbie…I can’t find the second version of my first draft of my former book, do you have it? Great, thanks. Can you send it to my other email address in a Word doc?”
Or…beep beep beep beep beep beep beep beep beep beep….ring, ring, ring…”Christina? I have to read you something. Do you have time? Or…I want your opinion on something totally non-writing related.”
Then there’s cyber hugs, of course. The prerequisite multiple parenthesis of love ((HUGS)). You find yourself thinking of someone when you’re not online. I knew Erica was sick and wondered how she was…and sometimes I think about Demon Baby when someone mentions a hmm, let’s say, adventuresome and unique child.
And there are links, and blog comments and lots of way to be connected to the people in your real life online world.
It can be a little awkward, you know, mentioning your online friends to the friends you stare at over a cup of coffee.
“I have this friend who’s an author, and she said…”
“Who?”
“Oh, you don’t know her, she lives in New York.”
I always get away with the cyber thing disguising it in the East Coast. Thank God I’m from Philadelphia. Midwesterners have no idea that I grew up knowing no one from New York, but to them, an accent is an accent and flat pizza is flat pizza. East Coast is East Coast.
I feel fortunate I’ve had a hand in building my own community, it’s like moving into Mayberry or into an apartment building and picking your neighbors. It’s a good thing. You can test-drive a friendship and see how it fits, and both parties can make it work best for them.
There are unusual circumstances where someone comes into your life through cyberspace but sticks to your heart and becomes part of your world outside the computer. I met one such person online in a MediaBistro Writing Class. We passed notes during class using our AOL instant messenger.
“What did she just say?”
“You read it right!”
“OMG, I mean, I don’t know you but do you believe that?”
We were meant to be friends. That was almost three years ago and she has become one of my closest friends who visits me in Chicago — she is in New Jersey — and who calls me to share her most intimate secrets. All because we met online. She is a confidant – though she started as a classmate. She understand me so well that I sometimes forget how we met or when — and that it wasn’t in 3rd grade 35 years ago.
What’s not real about that?
Tell me about how your online friendships have seeped into your real life…or do you keep it all separate?
I don’t keep my online friends separate. Thy are my friends, period. Like you, 99.9% of my writing relationships take place via cyber-space. And I have forged better friendships via cyber-space than outside of it. Could it be the writing common denominator? I don’t know. But writing is me, as it is them.
I have mentioned them to my non-cyber world peeps, but there are so few “non-cyber world peeps” that I mingle with, that when I do mention my writing buds, that’s how I refer to them, “A friend of mine who’s a writer.”
Wow, do I sound like a hermit or what?
There is someone (Starvingwritenow) who I see much more often online than locally. My best friend and I get to connect almost daily online. I’ve met some of my best friends online, including my husband.
My motto has always been to keep it real. I seem to attract real people that way. At least that’s my method, LOL.
Kathy – Nope, you don’t sound like a hermit! You sound like me!
Spy – I like your method, it’s mine too. It’s like cyber-karma.
Amy
Feel the same way you do about my cyber pals. The Internet is full of all kinds of goodnicks and creepoids, and I’ve been lucky/blessed to find some gems. You amongst ‘em.
…who don’t even mind when my brain glitches and I have to make another comment that I left out of the first: blog bling at my place waiting for you to pick up. hehe
Angie, Thanks!!!
What’s weird about the whole thing is that it IS real and not just a cyberspace thing – there are real people on the other end of the computer. Sometimes that’s difficult to grasp for me.
I’ve met so many amazing people online – and some true friends.
I sometimes feel that I simply don’t have the kinds of friendships anymore that I had when I was younger. And I miss that. At the same time, I also feel like my internet community of bloggers is more accepting, less judgmental, and WAY more varied than any group of friends I’ve ever had. Thanks for helping me to see it this way. I have lots of friends. Some I only “type” to, and some I talk to. But they’re all friendships that enrich my life.
Sometimes a blog friend will come up in family conversation, and it’s like they’re a friend from next door, the ease with which they are discussed. The comments I received for my daughter felt just as genuine as those from face-to-face friends, if not more genuine – when I think that the wishes and prayers came from people I’d never met! Amazing. And great.
LOL! Are you kidding! LOL! I met Kasie sometime mid december when she commented on one of my blogs and said we should be dream BFF’s or something like that… LOL! And now just two weeks ago we started co-authoring a Middle Grade book and in 10 days finished it (Last Wed.) the whole 40K! I’ve just pitched the idea to my agent and she wants it ASAP! LOL!
I don’t have a difference between writer friends or real friends, because deep down we’re all people and I love to get to know new people no matter who they are! They’re just fun! Plus I believe everything happens for a reason.. Muhahah! Even me reading this blog today! LOL! Cool huh!
Amy, The online blogging community that I’ve been fortunate to fall into are one of the most amazing groups of people in my life. I mean it, really. You, Angi, Ray, Elizabeth, Joanne, Anita, Wendy etc. are an incredible support system. I feel so fortunate to have you as my on-line friend, and I wouldn’t be surprise if our friendship spills over to the “real” world at some point. In fact, I hope it does. Thanks for this post!
The best friends I’ve ever known I met in a domestic violence shelter. Online friends? People are people, souls are souls. You meet who you are destined to meet to fulfill your destiny and grow as a human being. I feel this is rather akin to meeting at work, as this is really all about the profession of writing. Work Friends.
My brother had online friends long before I did, and I used to make fun of him, thinking of how pathetic it was, because I thought, ‘can’t you make friends in real life?’
But now, I understand. Now, I find myself crying if my blog friends are crying, celebrating at their victories. I do understand. Thanks to blogging. My brother, it’s not blogging, it’s art sites, and gaming sites, but it’s the same thing.
Yeah, I can see people rolling their eyes when I mention my blog friends. I’ve met one “live” so far and I had a blast. This is why I can’t wait to go to the convention b/c everyone there will “get” me.
I consider my online friends my friends. Where it gets weird is, like you say, when you’re talking to someone not in a writing community online, and you say, “Well, my friend so-and-so is going through x, y, and z” and when it becomes apparent I have never met the person in “real life” people look at me askance.
I have talked to online friends on the phone. I have written them when I have personal problems and offered support when they have been down. We have shared creative processes, which is a very intimate thing. And ultimately, I have four kids and I have hefty bills for college tuition, which means I am essentially a workaholic. My online friends are the support network I need for being a writer and being alone for much of the time.
Since all my writing friends are also online friends, I usually just call them my writing friends. Even that sounds silly sometimes because we often talk about everything BUT writing, even though that’s how we met. Just the other day I was explaining how I met this one guy who’s actually friends with an online writing friend, so I have two layers of never having met the people. Gets confusing for those not “in the know.”
I’ve gotten to know some of my online friends better than my real world friends, so I know longer differentiate them in my mind. I think about them, dream about them, worry about them – to me, that is the definition of a friend, not the fact that they can sit next to me on the couch. I’ve moved a lot in my life so maybe I’m more used to long-distance friendships.