Perils of I-Socializing
I've had a MySpace page for about 6 months now and until a few months ago wasn't particularly crazy about it, but something within me snapped and I suddenly became obsessed with increasing my number of friends. I felt I had calmed down on this tip and even though I had become a collector of sorts, gathering MySpace info when I met new people, I felt I still had standards I adhered to during the collection process. If I wouldn't actually want to hang out with them in real life, I saw no point in adding the person to my list of friends.
But one slipped through the nets.
After the Meet and Greet at the Collingwood Art Center last night, where I had done a fair share of meeting, greeting, and collecting, I was pleased to find that someone had sought me out. She looked slightly different in her photos than I remembered her looking last night, but I figured I was quite drunk at the time I met her and that could account for the discrepancy. So, without a thought I added her to my list. Then, curious what her profile looked like seeing that she is a photographer, I popped on over for a peek. I was surprised to hear Top 20 pop music with a shockingly pink background baring the quote "I sell Mary Kay!" I remembered that girl was slightly surly and healthily snarky, so I thought perhaps this could all be part of an elaborate ruse. I read on. "I love to read books about aromatherapy, angels, healthy healing by linda page, and most important of them all THE BIBLE!!" Ouch. But I continued, growing more intrigued with her sense of humor. Thinking (maybe hoping is a better verb here) perhaps that she had concocted a totally fake page, I glanced at her friends to figure out who we knew in common, surely this would betray her true self. Not seeing any familiar faces and an impressive amount of chatch, I began to suspect something was amiss. Shortly after I read about how much she loves her husband Frank and saw the pictures of her posing with the Frat she haus-frau'ed, it finally occured to me the sad mistake I had made.
I was now forced to a decision I'd never before had to make in the world of I-Socializing: Whether to drop my new friend or keep her around and hope no one ever looked her up. When I saw that she had immediately left a comment I knew what kind of friend she would be. She would not be the type to hang idly by in my list, inactive and silent. She would there to leave pictures of bunnies and post bulletins about the newest Mary Kay line. The answer became clear. The girl had to go.
And so as I clicked the box next to her photo, deselecting her as a friend of mine, I reflected on our brief friendship and realized how similar to and different from bar socializing I-socializing can be. Sure, you start a convo in a bar or similar setting with someone who seems interesting. You realize halfway into the conversation that the person is a/an idiot, jerk, etc. In that space you can walk away and no one is ever the wiser about your brief flirtation with friendship. However, in MySpace, there is a lingering record where Jacqueline/Jacquie is concerned. Her sadly doomed overature of friendship comment lives on for all to see, or at least until I make the effort to delete that too. Who knows how long that could take.
But one slipped through the nets.
After the Meet and Greet at the Collingwood Art Center last night, where I had done a fair share of meeting, greeting, and collecting, I was pleased to find that someone had sought me out. She looked slightly different in her photos than I remembered her looking last night, but I figured I was quite drunk at the time I met her and that could account for the discrepancy. So, without a thought I added her to my list. Then, curious what her profile looked like seeing that she is a photographer, I popped on over for a peek. I was surprised to hear Top 20 pop music with a shockingly pink background baring the quote "I sell Mary Kay!" I remembered that girl was slightly surly and healthily snarky, so I thought perhaps this could all be part of an elaborate ruse. I read on. "I love to read books about aromatherapy, angels, healthy healing by linda page, and most important of them all THE BIBLE!!" Ouch. But I continued, growing more intrigued with her sense of humor. Thinking (maybe hoping is a better verb here) perhaps that she had concocted a totally fake page, I glanced at her friends to figure out who we knew in common, surely this would betray her true self. Not seeing any familiar faces and an impressive amount of chatch, I began to suspect something was amiss. Shortly after I read about how much she loves her husband Frank and saw the pictures of her posing with the Frat she haus-frau'ed, it finally occured to me the sad mistake I had made.
I was now forced to a decision I'd never before had to make in the world of I-Socializing: Whether to drop my new friend or keep her around and hope no one ever looked her up. When I saw that she had immediately left a comment I knew what kind of friend she would be. She would not be the type to hang idly by in my list, inactive and silent. She would there to leave pictures of bunnies and post bulletins about the newest Mary Kay line. The answer became clear. The girl had to go.
And so as I clicked the box next to her photo, deselecting her as a friend of mine, I reflected on our brief friendship and realized how similar to and different from bar socializing I-socializing can be. Sure, you start a convo in a bar or similar setting with someone who seems interesting. You realize halfway into the conversation that the person is a/an idiot, jerk, etc. In that space you can walk away and no one is ever the wiser about your brief flirtation with friendship. However, in MySpace, there is a lingering record where Jacqueline/Jacquie is concerned. Her sadly doomed overature of friendship comment lives on for all to see, or at least until I make the effort to delete that too. Who knows how long that could take.
1 Comments:
Dont be a Jessica! Dont falsify the historical record in your own favour by deleting comments!
It does sound like you made a carefully considered decision. Problem is, two years from now when this whole thing has escalated out of control into a Toledo-wide anger-fest, and you randomly run into her chatch husband and his mates in a bar downtown, insults are traded and it all turns ugly, they drag you outside and kick you to death in the street, the reporters opening words on "Americas True Crime Stories" will be:
"Cassandra J thought she had it all, until one day a simple misunderstanding about her Myspace page escalated into savage murder! We'll be right back with the Toledo Myspace Killing, after these messages."
Or I could just be a big drama monger. Do you think maybe she saw the "Dinosaurs lived only 6000 years ago" post and thought "Finally, someone who hasnt been blinded by the satanic Liberal conspiracy known as "evolution"! I must send her that link to the collected speeches of Dr Kent Hovind I have at the top of my favorites list."
-eoin, "real" myspace freind
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