On-Line Life

So what is your on-line life? With the advent of on-line gaming, social networks, chat rooms, and surfing there's so much on-line now that we use to define ourselves. Currently I've got a Facebook account, MySpace account (that was on the wane though), and a couple of blogs. While I've created all these things I do realize that there's a lot of information out there that people can read or see about me. If you're a frequenter to those site you know that I'm married, have kids and even know my dogs name. I've made friends all over the world, and yes, some enemy's but have never actually met any of them. So what did I do before all this? What has access to the internet created in me that I didn't have before? Not much actually, read on... When I was younger I always had a hard time making casual friends. I always had one or two that I felt close to and their still friends of mine today. Folks like JC Tallman, David Day, Dave Stock, Jay Fox, and Tim Strickland are some of the ones that have been my closest friends and I still keep in contact with many of them. The level of friends that I'm talking about is the casual friends, the ones you had because you where a member of a group, or organization. Those are the ones that I've always had issues with. There's probably a few reasons for this, first tend to shy aways from groups because I don't feel I need them to identify myself, and secondly me devotion to the people I felt where close to me. That's a little vague but let me explain using a different type of relationship. Being that I'm a guy I have real problems having girls as friends without wanting the relationship to turn sexual. Whenever I have a girls as a friend, there always reaches a point in the relationship where I want more than mere friendship. Even as a teenager I wanted girls as girlfriends not casual friends. Those that I did have as girlfriends I wanted to become even more; in other words I fell in love with every girl. This inability of mine to see what the relationship potential actually was caused me to drive a lot of very nice girls away. For guys however I have this same desire to be the best friend possible but since love isn't in the equation there's no desire to make it any more than that. So what does that have to do with my on-line life? I now have more casual friends than I know what to do with but it's been difficult to realize what type of friend they really are. Lately Facebook has been occupying a lot of my on-line time. I really like the game applications like Homeworld, Mob Wars, and Knighthood. I never got involved with other on-line gaming schemes like World of Warcraft, so this is rather new to me. What I've found though is a whole world of casual friends. Maybe one or two might turn into the close friend category but chances are thin. I'm liking things the way they are though, here's a group of people whom I have something in common with but there's no responsibility to any of them for anything other than playing a game. I know that last sentence seems shallow on my part but this type of relationship is the norm on the internet. When I was younger (before the internet) friends where made be meeting people. Normally this was by working with them, going to school or church together, or living next to someone. We also used to have "pen-pals" that could have been anywhere in the world but only the most outgoing people put the time in to write the letters. Now we have a world wide web of users that have replaced the "pen-pal". social networks like Facebook and MySpace have created an easy way for anyone to meet folks from all around the world. I now have friends in Australia, Great Briton, Hong Kong, Japan, and elsewhere. You name it and I've probably have talked with someone from that country. 30 years ago when I was in high school, to have this level of world wide contact was unfathomable. Even if you had a few pen-pals it wouldn't be anything close to the variety on-line social network give us. Yes there's some whack-O's out there but for the most part people are what-you-see-is-what-you-get. I know that most of these people I'll never actually meet but I sure do enjoy their company. I also know that if I travel around the world that I at least know someone. So what's in the future for us? In 20 years are we going to have virtual relationships that are taken to the next level? Will we have virtual marriages between folks that never really meet? I don't think it'll get that bad but I will say your on-line life will probably play a bigger part in your social life as the internet matures. Who knows maybe you will meet the love of your life half a world away. Not me however, my best friend and the love of my life is living with me now. we didn't meet on-line we met in person, shooting pool in a bar, like normal people do.