Neal's Yard, Covent Garden, London.
Last weekend in London, on a drizzling Saturday, I made my way to The Fellow, a gastropub near King’s Cross/St. Pancras station. I stepped into its cozy interior and immediately caught the glance of Mike Sowden, the blogger behind Fevered Mutterings who I’ve known primarily as @mikeachim on Twitter. He rose from his chair, and I gave him a hug. I was thrilled to meet him.
Thing is, I didn’t know Mike existed until sometime in 2010. And I don’t really know him.
Or do I?
The Creation of “Online”
My first experience fusing my online world with real life was in my sophomore or junior year of high school (1995-96). I had an America Online screenname, RsrvoirGrl, to dial into a wondrous new universe called the World Wide Web, accessed by dialing a number on my computer. Creating a screenname was a milestone, and it was important to select an appropriate name that best reflected who I was, as I was forging an identity in this new world. In these early years of cyberspace, I went through several screennames—first, slightly different variations of “Reservoir Girl” (a nod to Quentin Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs), and then more personal screennames, which included parts of my name or birthdate.
Cyberspace was the most incredible new way to spend free time without leaving the house. But I didn’t understand what “online” meant and where, in this virtual realm, I was. All I knew was I could enter “rooms” and talk to other people my age (in teen chat rooms) and with similar interests (mainly film).
View of the Golden Gate Bridge from Kirby Cove.
After chatting for a while with a boy who lived in Woodland—near Davis, California—we decided to meet in San Francisco one afternoon and both agreed to bring a friend to make the encounter less nerve-wracking. We planned to meet at the corner of Haight and Ashbury. (Naturally.)
I won’t address the details, but let’s just say our spirited, engaging online chats about film, music, and life did not lead to in-the-flesh chemistry. In fact, our in-person conversation was awkward and painful. Oh my god, I thought, staring at him from across the table, as we ate our slices at Escape From New York Pizza. I don’t know this person at all, I don’t want to know him, what am I doing here, let’s run out of this restaurant, help me, this sucks. Unlike today, where avatars are integral parts of social media profiles, in 1995 there were no photos, nor were there detailed profiles of strangers you talked to; all you had to rely on was a chat room transcript and—if your online chats led to phone calls—the sound of the person’s voice, and the vibe you sensed over the phone. Perhaps that was enough. Or not.
I was 15 or 16 at this time, so I gather the encounter, had I been older, could have been different. Still, the idea of the Internet (and the connections created on it) was new for everyone, no matter the age. We were all experimenting, like curious humans plugging into a Matrix.
* * *
After the novelty of chat rooms wore off, and I concluded that online friendships (and subsequent in-person meetups) were superficial, I spent less time chatting with strangers and more time instant messaging with my friends. My best friend Ann and I used to talk on the phone for hours. But for the most part, I have never been fond of long phone conversations, nor am I a talkative person to begin with. Instant messaging on the computer, then, was a welcome form of communication, but not all of my friends interacted online, be it via email or AOL instant messenger. (And even when I was in college, we had no Facebook-like outlet.) At Loyola Marymount University, from 1997 to 2001, some friends simply were not interested in the online world, as abstract as it felt. Most friends could only be reached in the flesh or a landline—landline! An extinct word!—and a few via cell phone. (I was the first in my crew to get a cell phone, in fall 1998.)
The launch of Friendster in 2002 began to define the still-elusive online world. With Friendster, “going online” now meant more than logging on to check email. Friendster was so hot, so hip—friends and friends-of-friends I mingled with in bars and clubs were on it, as well as pseudo-familiar faces and cute guys I’d seen at parties. Going online meant sifting through these profiles on my computer, in private—I learned about people without having to talk to them.
LovEvolution party at the Civic Center, San Francisco.
Throw in MySpace in 2003 and 2004, and this online universe was fully developed. It breathed on its own and was separate from real life: I communicated online with people I didn’t hang out with in person. I exchanged friendly messages with acquaintances who ignored me when we ran into one another at a bar. A hierarchy existed, much like the one in real life: the cool kids, the hipsters, the social whores were recognizable by high friend counts, aesthetically pleasing profiles, many testimonials, and clever “About Me” and “Who I’d Like to Meet” sections. I added friends like I was collecting passport stamps; I tweaked my profile HTML to tailor a persona. On every social network I’ve joined, I’ve gone through the same account creation-deletion-creation-deletion cycle: Becoming irritated with the unspoken etiquette (or lack of) among friends. Struggling with how best to present my virtual self. Acclimating to a specific network and its privacy options.
Today, I’ve reached a level of comfort regarding my online persona from all the experimentation, the observation of behavior, and the self-awareness over the years. Perhaps crafting a second, virtual self requires a level of maturity, or is an art to be perfected.
What I can say for sure? It’s taken me years to become comfortable with my virtual projection.
The Evolution of an Avatar
Recently on Twitter, I believe it was @eugenephoto who suggested to his followers to follow @legalnomads (Jodi Ettenberg). Why? Well, he said, Jodi has an excellent Twitter stream.
In this age of hashtags, promoted tweets, and DMs, I’m fascinated each day by the tools and practices I must keep up with. We’ve also moved beyond simple first names; you don’t have a name unless you’ve got an @ sign in front of it, right? Along with this comes the strange, amusing comments I find myself making in conversations. Your avatar is awesome. She’s such a great follow. I can’t believe that was trending today. He @replied me yesterday and thanked me for my FF.
Umm, what?
Remember the days when we complimented people the old-fashioned way? She’s got killer legs. He’s got big, beautiful eyes. That is sooooo 15 years ago, isn’t it? Today’s ultimate compliment: She’s got a fabulous Twitter stream.
Don’t think I’m poking fun at @eugenephoto (or @legalnomads). In fact, these two people, who I’ve never met in person, are among the most all-around resourceful and intriguing individuals I follow on Twitter, and it’s because of tweets (and digital presences) like theirs that I’ve begun to formulate my ideas on why online connections are significant and—for me—necessary.
Crown Princess in Roatan, Honduras, Caribbean.
I created @cherilucas in spring 2009, but didn’t actively use it. Over at Trazzler, we created regional Twitter accounts in addition to @Trazzler, and I began to share our content on those handles. It wasn’t until fall 2009, when I was invited on Princess Cruises’ #FollowMeAtSea Twitter cruise to the Caribbean, that I had to establish an online persona. From then on—and by default—I began to build my presence, as insignificant as it was, in the online travel industry. (Initially, I followed education publications and personalities, too, as I was a freelance K-12 reporter at the time. But juggling education and travel on a single handle just didn’t work, so I stopped promoting my non-travel work altogether.)
Fast forward to 2010. Given my tendency to grow irked with the social network du jour, I realized my universe on Twitter had become a bubble. Ninety percent of the people I followed were in the travel industry—and not only that, they lived and breathed travel, all day, every day. The active promotion of oneself and peers, and the dedication to the industry and to good writing, is wonderful.
But still, I purged my list. Not because I’m a snob, but because it felt unnatural to read tweets about travel every second of the day, and to eavesdrop on the same talking heads interacting in a flurry of @replies, RTs, FFs, TTs, and LOLs in an airtight sphere, the same ideas swirling about. It felt intrusive being asked to follow someone. Or to “please RT” something. Or to “like” a Facebook page. At first, I thought I was being too critical: Isn’t this virtual? Isn’t this supposed to feel fake to a degree?
No. I don’t think it has to be that way.
What, then, do I want to get out of Twitter? For me, Twitter isn’t focused on the social; it’s certainly not Facebook. Yet it isn’t a sterile, strictly professional platform. The more time passes, the more I appreciate the people I follow, many of whom I’ve never met but am connected to for some reason, whether via Trazzler, travel, nonfiction, San Francisco, or otherwise. I’ve recently paid more attention to less people—individuals who share ideas across many interests, or who share their work (and mine) without expecting automatic reciprocation, or who are clever and wickedly inappropriate, or who are silly and don’t take themselves so damn seriously. In other words, my Twitter universe is now populated with people.
And so I come back to @legalnomads, a travel blogger and former lawyer whom I appreciate because of her diverse tweet topics, from science to photography and literature to astronomy. And through her, I found @eugenephoto, a photographer and blogger also with an array of interests.
And so, what does it mean to have a stellar Twitter stream? Silly as that sounds, it means an individual on Twitter is three-dimensional. It means I sense who this person is from the content they curate. It means I’d feel comfortable plucking their avatar out of my stream, placing them in a seat across from me at a table in the real world, and shooting the shit. It means in lieu of a “BECOME A FAN ON FACEBOOK!” or a Follow Friday tweet crammed with 20 @names, I get a glimpse into a person’s mind: curious and empathetic, thoughtful and funny.
If you use social media in a way that works for you, online connections can be meaningful. After 15 years of dabbling in the online world, I think I’ve finally figured out how to do it.
Avatars in the Flesh
Beer, Pub, Oxford, UK.
And so, back to London.
I don’t quite recall how I started following @mikeachim on Twitter, but I think it involved a tweet about a movie (Memento? The Usual Suspects?) and a mutual liking for stories that end with abrupt twists. And that’s why I love Twitter: you interact one day with a stranger about something you love or are interested in, and from there, a connection—based on ideas—develops. We are our own curators of multimedia content, sifting through the noise, finding what we like. And in the same vein, we handpick individuals—well, avatars—who we let into our (virtual) lives, to entertain us, to chat with us, to teach us things each day.
So, meeting up with Mike (and Nick Rowlands, another travel writer, whom I hung out with in San Francisco and Las Vegas last year), was a treat on Saturday. Three fine avatars at one table, drinking pints, eating a meal—I tried black pudding!—and laughing a great deal about all sorts of things, travel and non-travel.
* * *
We live in a time where things change so fast—where the definition of “friend” continues to evolve in the age of Facebook.
I ask myself again: do I know Mike?
I may not know Mike in the everyday, traditional sense, but as I sat there and chatted with him and Nick—who has become a good friend—I realized: I know him enough to sit here and not want to run out of the restaurant. I know him enough to laugh at his stories. I know him enough to talk about our hopes and goals for travel, for writing, for the future.
I don’t know about you, but in my worlds—virtual and real—that is a friend.
Other Parts in this Virtual Life Series:
- Notes on Virtual Life, Part II: Facebook, Twitter & the Seeds of Compartmentalization
- Notes on Virtual Life, Part III: Nomadic Relationships
- Notes on Virtual Life, Part IV: On Unplugging & Merging Virtual and Real
- Notes on Virtual Life, Part V: Proximity & Physical Space
- Notes on Virtual Life, Part VI: Facebook Status Updates (And What I Could Have Said)
after reading this splendid piece of work i think i know how to use my twitter account more wiisely,
thanks for the thoughtful post
and i would like to add, I love hanging out in this blogging world, commenting, discovering having fun. internet is one awesome thing!
I wrote this post last spring and I’m still quite attached to it — really glad you enjoyed it.
I very much enjoyed this, Cheri. I, like most people, prefer online reads that are very brief. If I have to scroll “below the fold,” I usually hope even a good post ends in the next expanse of screen height. However, with this I scrolled down and thought “I’m glad this isn’t ending yet.”
The details of your two restaurant encounters lock eyes across years and miles to montage toward some truth. You are both a dweller in the habitat and a recollector who surveys the assemblage of memories and discerns what deserves the upper display shelves. (It sounds like, with a much starker contrast between narrators, this is what you were describing for your raver memoir.)
I’m reminded of Charlotte from the movie “Lost in Translation.” She would now be about 30-31 and would perhaps also have started to have found out what her life is, what she wants it to be, and what’s possible with ever-changing technologies.
I’m glad you’re reflecting and sharing.
-Kevin
P.S I found my way here via Stan Carey’s Twitter.
I’d like to think my “would … have started to have found out” grammaticalizes a new temporal concept engendered by the modern online reality of access to our past thoughts and relationships and is not merely a temporary confusion of “would have started to find out” and “would have liked to have found out.” But I would be wrong.
Wow — I love the way you articulated your thoughts in that second paragraph (of the first comment). I enjoy so much making connections between disparate threads and moments often separated by a long lapse of time, but this kind of writing doesn’t come naturally (nor regularly), and for some reason your comments remind me that the vault of memories and experiences I use to make such connections is vast, and simply takes time (and perspective) to sift through.
Thanks for the thoughtful comments, and glad you stumbled upon my blog!
Though I am working my way through this series slowly, and out of order – I must say what a true home run it is. This in particular simply hits the nail on the head.
In the age of facebook, those I consider my friends fall under a different definition than they did a decade ago. However, I truly believe that the friends I have at this time in my life are far better friends than the people I ran around with in college (or even farther back, high school). Thanks to tools like twitter, I’ve been able to make more informed choices where my friends and confidants are concerned and while there has been an occasional downside to it – I can say that truly it’s mostly great! I don’t think I would undo twitter even if I could.
Beautiful post, and one that touches on a lot of important issues that are becoming increasingly relevant to growing numbers of people. Not got a great deal to add, since you and Mike and others have already covered everything so well, but I do have a few observations.
1. I’m kinda surprised to learn how plugged in you were as a kid… though given the amount of time you spend on your magic phone, I shouldn’t be ; )
2. Managing online personas. It’s interesting to me that we can manage our projection online in a way that we simply cannot do in the “real world”. I have issues with this. Not so much about how people perceive me, but with how they might think I’m trying to project myself. Does that make sense? The section in my latest matador post where I mention being retweeted in tahrir square brushes against this.
3. On culling twitter. I totally hear you on this: follow fewer people, have more meaningful interactions. I recently purged my follower list from around 850 to 300 ish. I just couldn’t/didn’t want to keep track of all that data, especially when so much of it was travel related. 300 is more manageable, but still a lot, especially since many of those are very active. (And if I unfollowed someone who reads this, I’m sorry, it was nothing personal. I’m going to have to write about this at some point.) Interestingly, a load of people unfollowed me in response, which perhaps shows there’s a lot more tit-for-tat in that world than we might realize. Fair does.
4. On twitter in general. It would be the last social network I ditched. I’d much rather kill facebook. Why? Because twitter is asymmetrical and introduces a lot more randomness than Facebook and other sites can. You can bump into and interact with a wider range of people than elsewhere (in my experience), on a wider range of topics. I feel that in a world where we are increasingly allowed to tailor our information consumption to what we are already interested in, this novelty is very important.
5. Hanging with you and Mike was one of the highlights of my time back in England. We have to do it again.
Something I meant to add to point two, above. Honesty. It’s the best way – it’s what I want to write, and what I want to read. I very much appreciate the honesty – sometimes vulnerability – of your posts. Life is at its most powerful when we attempt to strip away the masks.
1) Yeah, yeah. Cheri and her magic phone. Yada yada yada. I can pay attention, you know. But I’ll do better next time, promise.
2) Yep, I do get what you mean (and noticed this in your Matador post). I think you need to write/expand on that sometime, esp. since other people’s ideas of virtual persona (and how one manages their own) is fascinating to me.
4) Asymmetrical — good way to describe.
5) Likewise.
6) Thanks for this afterthought. I agree about honesty/vulnerability — that’s the stuff I like to read, and what I try to write.
5. It was the highlight of the month for Mike, too. And it *flew*. So much so that when I left at 5pm I was an hour late in meeting my friends, and got into trouble….
I do think we need to schedule in more time next time. Felt like we barely scratched the surface.
3. Nick and Cheri, that’s a major failing of my Twitter account right now. I’m following a vast amount of people and actually reading a very small percentage of them. Which I did to do the whole self-promotion thing, but…it’s frustrating. I spend my time using my List to keep up with people, not my main Twitter stream. So your example is one I need to follow. (I definitely need to be less spammy / “social-media-guru”ey).
Oh, and right now, Cheri, I’m commenting on your blog and I can see you’re commenting on mine. That’s *very* polite of both of us. Fine work.
i enjoyed this post immensely, of how you moved from chat rooms to IM to now tweeting. i haven’t anything of value to add about online friends, meeting in person etc.
but i am curious: how was the black pudding?
Ah! I had a dollop atop a piece of bread, and it was quite tasty! They didn’t want to tell me what it was, but after I ate it I learned it was made of blood and sausage. No biggie — in Filipino culinary culture we have many sauces and dishes using blood.
Thanks for the note!
Cheri, thank you for the mention and the kind words. In the overwhelming amount of ways that we can communicate, Twitter remains one of the few entirely self-curating media options. And through it I’ve been fortunate enough to meet some incredible people who – bolstered by similar interests or a thirst to learn as much as possible – have become friends. Some I’ve not even met yet, like yourself or Mike or Ms. Pigeon or Eugene. Despite only communicating online, each of you has affected my life in your own way — and that’s pretty incredible. It isn’t supplanting traditional interaction or relationships, but rather adding to it an a way that wasn’t possible a decade or two ago. Hope we do manage to meet up in 2011! Until then, safe travels and thanks again.
Yeah, it’s incredible that people I know online, mainly on Twitter, have affected me in different ways — small and big — creatively, personally, intellectually. And yes, these connections certainly add to the ones I already have — although I’m still pondering my thoughts on this (“real life” vs. online friendships). More soon.
Hope to meet in 2011, too. I know you once wrote you would be in my neck of the woods sometime, so keep me in the loop.
You brought back a funny memory for me… the internet of the mid-nineties…where it felt perfectly safe to meet in person strange guys I really knew nothing about! Was I silly, lucky or was the world just that different?
Maggs–
Ha, thank you for bringing this discussion back to the simplest question: What the hell was I thinking meeting some strange dude, from Davis of all places, at Haight/Ashbury?
Oh, 1995.
What a great, great post. Your point about wanting to be on Twitter because people are three-dimensional is a great one and something I am still developing. I do a better job on my blog where I have the time and ability to develop my personality. Through our blog, we have made many online friendships and I have been delighted to find that we have liked everyone we thought we would like (including Jodi, actually). Virtual friendships have allowed us the ability to meet people who share our interests even though they may not be in the same location as us. [And, now, I'm excited to add you to my Twitter stream.]
I do a better job on my blog where I have the time and ability to develop my personality. Interesting point — I agree, with our blogs we have the space and time to create our personas, our styles, our worlds. Yet on Twitter, it’s not the same — “expressing yourself” via 140-character musings and links and shared content is different. But, as Mike said above, there are those that just *get* it. I love finding these people. Gems.
I’ll have to peruse your site! Thanks for visiting here.
Thank you for a well written & thoughtful post. You hit straight to the bull’s eye of virutal almost anything-including virtual relationships.
We are all searching for real depth and meaning-no matter what the delivery system.
I was early to computers but late to social media, but I too have picked up on its often claustrophobic nature, and like in real life, have started to be more selective in those that I allow into my life,virtual or otherwise.
Sharon–
Yes, depth. And it’s possible to find this in online connections. It took me a while to experience it for myself, but I have.
I like the word you use — “selective.” It reminds me of how I seem to maneuver the waters online in the same way I do in real life. I have many friends and acquaintances online and off, but to be honest I can count the people I want to spend most of my time with on one hand. It’s like, just because there are a gazillion people online, all waiting to friend you, to add you, to connect with you, doesn’t mean you have to befriend them.
Thanks for saying hello here.
Many years ago someone I loved dearly said this to me: A friend is someone that you can call at midnight and say “I’m out of gas. Can you come and get me?” And when they say yes, you tell them that you are in Texas, and they tell you to hunker down, they are getting on the next plane.
As I age, I find myself shedding baggage, both literal and figurative, and that includes people. It’s totally OK to have a handful that you/they love unconditionlly in my book.
Gorgeous post.
And so very much on my mind as time goes on. I’ve spent the last year feeling deeply conflicted about Twitter – loving the discussion, hating the empty RTing and vacuous compliments-that-aren’t, loving the personalities, hating the bot-people (not just the bots, but the people who allow themselves to sound like bots, flat and humourless and unengaged and unengaging…).
I love Twitter. I hate Twitter. There is no contradiction.
But when it comes to the core of this post, the reality of online relationships and that oh-so-modern weirdness of counting someone a friend when you’ve never met them?
I’m good with that concept. I’m fine with it. Sometimes it doesn’t work out when you meet, and that’s just awful to experience. It happened to me once, very badly, and I almost literally ran for it.
But I don’t blame the principle like some people (AHEM popular media) like to do. It’s a massive, colossally expanded extension of penpals, snailmail pen-friends, and they were always acceptable. Yes, of course it’s easy to misrepresent yourself online, but it takes far more effort than some people would like to think. And we aren’t stupid. Sometimes something tells us the other person isn’t all they seem. We’re getting good at recognizing the signs.
The good people online, the smart people, the ones worth following and sparking conversation with (like thee and Nick and ‘Pigeon and Jodi and that Mr Spellman), are the ones with a talent for being themselves. That’s hard. It’s scary, too. But they make the effort. The people who have mastered it, who let their personality shine through, are the ones who are using the internet correctly. People who don’t allow themselves to make friendships online by being themselves…are, I reckon, missing the whole and entire point of the internet.
Just connect.
That said, that Sowden character sounds like a serial killer.
ps. I’m doing my own version of this post on my blog soon. I was planning to anyway, but now I’m doubly planning to. Yes.
An odd concept, isn’t it — mastering the art of being yourself. You know, sometimes I’m hesitant to write the more personal stuff — the musings on love (from my past, and what I hope for the future), writing about my family, my fears about adulthood — but I eventually just go with it, and later realize: Hey, this is really me. Sure, I go off on worldly adventures solo, I live my life as I’d like (and enjoy it), but I can also be lonely. And immature. And scared of what’s next.
And that’s the stuff that people seem to respond to the most — the three-dimensionality, the flaws, the humanness — and in turn, that’s what I appreciate about some of the best writing out there…from all of you guys.
Looking forward to your take on all this!
What. An. Excellent. Post. Loved this and something I think about frequently. I, too, have done a couple purges in the last couple months. Social media, specifically Twitter, is about conversations and relationships. I don’t just want someone to follow me so that maybe I’ll get a few “clicks” out of them. I want their to be an engagement, connection. While I haven’t liked all the Twitter people I’ve met in person, I’ve liked most of them. I’ve found that if I really connected and liked them on Twitter, that that was multiplied when I met them in person. It’s one of the things I’m really looking forward to on my upcoming trip to California.
So glad you connected with Mike. He’s one of my favorites that I’ve yet to meet in person yet.
Yeah, the whole “purge” process is interesting — something I’ve eventually done on all the networks I’ve joined, from Friendster to MySpace to Facebook to Twitter. And I’ve begun to enjoy Twitter so much more because of it — the whole “paying more attention to less people” makes engagement easier — and natural. I feel like I’m talking to people now (yay!), rather than avatars and bots.
Again, that’s awesome you’re headed to California! Hopefully the weather behaves for you…
Hooray!!! What a great post, Cheri… and I can only imagine the awesomeness of the Pharaonick/Mikeachim/Cherilucas crossover. Worlds colliding in the best possible way.
Thanks, Pigeon Eater! As Mike, Nick, and I had previously said, it was a splendid time, and we hope to do it again someday, when the universe allows. Sorry there wasn’t any live tweeting of a whiskey-mogwai-transformation. Next time, for sure.