Lesson Eighteen.
Reaching beyond what you think you know.
Your instructor is Professor
Taltos.
Hello again! Glad to see you; let’s carry on where I
left off last time.
As I was saying last time, I have experienced a wide
variety of different things in my life. I sport a great love for adventures and
go out of my way sometimes just to find one. There have been times when my love
for adventure gets me into a little hot water, but generally I manage to stay out
of trouble. However none of the adventures I have had prepared me for the
intense emotions and feelings I began to experience when I entered the chat
rooms. Intense is a good word for it. This feeling, for me, is akin to
loneliness. A type of loneliness that runs deep and then settles in your soul.
Strangely, this loneliness is a state you may want to never end. Every time I
feel it I think of the term ‘a contradiction of terms’, for even though you
feel loneliness, you are delighted to be feeling it.
I have to say I believe this lonely feeling is due to
a few facts. One is that I know odds are I’ll never meet any of the friends I
have made in the chat rooms. I have grown very fond of some of the people I have
met in chats. To never be able to hope to see him or her in person, somehow this
makes the whole experience much more meaningful. This is a feeling shared with
pretty well all those I have met online so far. I know I have only interviewed
a very small percentage of the people in chats so my statistics are of only a
few in a population of many. Some of us will be able to meet at conventions and
parties. But generally we all know we will probably never be able to physically
touch each other. To compensate for this I think we have created a world, in the
chat rooms, that stimulates our imaginations and actually lets us reach beyond
ourselves.
I can’t
say for sure but I think I would call it all part of the evolution of the human
race. We have to go to much greater lengths to keep our imaginations alive and
thriving. Our world is fast becoming a world that encourages imaginations. As a
matter of fact if you think about it, a great many jobs call for a good
imagination. For example, video game programmers, forensics teams, technical
engineers, they all need to have a good imagination. It’s a world where
freaker balls are now blasé. The gothic styles and role-playing are the norm
today. I think this can only do good things for relationships. If it’s all
handled properly. That’s the key part of this equation ‘if it’s handled
properly’!
I’m going to stick my neck out and voice an opinion
that won’t be popular with the rest of the world. But what the heck here goes.
I personally believe that the chat rooms are one of the safest ways to meet
someone. Whether you are looking for love, romance, friendship, or fantasy I
think as long as you’re not naive about things. And as long as you realize
this isn’t a real world and treat it as such, you will remain safe.
I read a quote from Robin Williams a while back, in it
he said, “The world is evolving at a amazing rate. What once took us twenty
years to do (in reference to our technology) will soon take us only two.”
Robin Williams is exactly right, we are growing in leaps and bounds. It only
goes to follow that we need to learn how to expand our minds. In short our
society will be full of what, we today call, computer nerds. Ain’t that a kick
in the head?
My point is if you want to sit on your duff and whine
about the poor grammar (hi Harry) (another dear brother) and how weird these
things are and how bad it has become, this only tells me you aren’t trying to
understanding the wonderful world of computers. It only follows that you are
missing out on a lot of fun. Why not put away the skepticism? Roll up you
sleeves and give it a try. The worst that may happen is you may come away a wee
bit richer in life from having experienced it.
For those of you who are (like me) still hearing all
the negative input, have heart my friends! I still get the same smart-ass
remarks and dumb jokes every day. My real world isn’t always kind or
understanding to my ways. But rather than get into long-winded debates over the
subject, I try to get them to at least try. If at the end of it all they still
feel the same, then I promise I will never bring the subject up again. I
haven’t had any takers yet (not in my private circle anyway). So when it comes
to the scoffers and doubters in my world I tend to usually just walk away. You
can lead a horse to the water and all that.
I know this may be a cop out, but trust me: on the few
occasions, since I started to write this column, that I have tried to share my
experiences with my real world peers, I was for the large part disappointed. To
be honest some of those occasions have actually left me feeling frustrated and
only more convinced that there are some people that walk around with their heads
up their butts. I am grateful that my dear Mom taught me to pick and choose my
battles and to know when I was flogging a dead horse. Thanks to Mom, I have
become extremely in-tuned to people who really want to stretch their minds.
Within ten minutes of a conversation about my work I can tell if the person is
really interested or if they’re just being polite. This saves me a lot of time
and energy, and it saves the individual from hearing a long boring story about a
subject they have no interest in.
To those of you that haven’t tried to experience
this type of lifestyle, I am sending a message. I figured I’d try to get it
out this way and kill a few birdies with one stone, so to speak. My message is
this: You don’t have any idea what your missing and if you find out years
from now what a wonderful experience this is, boy are you going to be pissed
at yourself for taking so long. Those of you who have been there, and like
me, keep going back for more, I say carry on bravely my friend. You are not
alone!
As for me, well I will continue going to the chat
rooms. Hopefully I will continue to enjoy my visits there, too. I’ve not only
found sources for some really good writing, I’ve also found that my insight to
relationships has been honed somewhat from my experiences there. The best part
has to be that I’ve found a whole new dimension for my imagination to play in.
Long avenues of adventures are awaiting my arrival and I’m going to have a
blast going down them.
As for the rest of this program, we have two more
lessons left. The last half of lesson twenty will be spent on outlining an idea
I have for our next quest. I’d hate to see you all leave me and I think it’s
way past time some of you shared with me why you are reading these every second
week. But the lesson plans for this are in the infancy stage right now and I
have to make sure it’s okay to go ahead with my idea.
The reason I say the last half of lesson twenty is all
I will allow for this is because I want to spend our final lesson, lesson
nineteen and a half of twenty reviewing some of the rooms I haven’t gone to.
And some I have in more detail. I am finding I am actually enjoying the
challenge of getting some of the more steamy facts their due time. Perhaps I
shall look further into a smutty book next time. LOL!
At any rate my dear readers I will say goodnight to
you all for the time being.
This is Professor Taltos signing off for now.
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