Friday 9 January 2009

Sleep

This is who I lose sleep over

Who am I?

I thought that I should find out a bit about myself if I was going to really look at how I feel about things, so I took an online personality test - very scientific. Usually, I think these thing are pretty silly, but I have to be honest, this one has me nailed.

Click to view my Personality Profile page

Thursday 1 January 2009

Second Life - you know that place?

I'm interested in online relationships, and peoples experiences of them. I've had several, and if you're reading this you probably have to. How was it? Disaster, ecstasy ot just plain silly? Share your stories with me, and I'll tell you mine.

I mostly hang out in Second Life where I've been regularly addicted for over two years. I don't know much about other virtual worlds (are they virtual worlds???) so would love to hear if you think there are others I should see.

So here we are on the 1st January 2009, like most people I'm thinking about resolutions. Hmmm, I never stick to them anyway, so what's the point really. I decided to do something that I'd stick to, and it's because of someone I met in Second Life.

Something happened to me a few days ago (well really a few months ago, but the few days ago bit is the important bit) that inspired me to want to do something special. I met someone in Second Life (SL), in about October, and I felt that kind of frisson that you get in real life (RL) when you sense that there might be something special about to happen. I didn't see this person
again for weeks, and when I did, that feeling was still there, and we started spending more and more time together, to the point that I felt I wanted to let me feelings take their own decisions and just see what happened. What happened was I asked her to be my girlfriend, and she said yes! If you don't understand what this means in a virtual world, it's very hard to explain, all I can say is, try it, and see what you think, but it's very, very intense, scarey and exciting.

Now, I've been involved with people before in SL, even to point of meeting in real life (she stood me up), and thought I'd had a closeness with someone, in fact, I'd had some sort of shared daydream, or holiday romance or something. This is very different, and it was something she said that made me realise. She asked if I had an RL girlfriend, and to tell her if I did. At first I was going to answer that I didn't (which was true), but I said I did, because I realised that I felt this lovely girl really was my girlfriend, and that fact that we only meet in a weird online place didn't seem to matter. I've decided that if she's my virtual girlfriend, then really it's no different to her being my real girlfriend too. It's not a feeling I've had ( or she says, she's had) before.

I've always been interested in how people behave emotionally with each other online, in places that they feel they can be completely themselves, or completely someone else. I'm a real profile hound in SL, always looking for clues about peoples love lives in the little comments they make, who they partner or those little epitaphs to broken hearts and lost lovers they have in their Profile Picks. If you'd like to tell me about your experiences, I'd love to hear.