A deep question posed on another site, that I thought I’d cross post to people reading the blog. Who, what or where is your profane salvation? Is it your spouse? your children? faith in a God? Is it music? Just something probably too deep to be thinking about on a Friday but profound nonetheless.
I was probably the weird one and said the internet. That may sound strange but the internet has been responsible for so many new and expansive experiences in my life. I grew up in your average posthumous small down; very isolated, very populist, very afraid of new or…change. I was very very shy, and still am…almost to the point of complete and utter anxiety around people, especially those I don’t know that well. You can tell pretty easily when I’m at ease and when I’m not. In any sense, growing up in that kind of environment made it very easy for one to feel alone, different, abnormal and unrelatable. I didn’t have many friends and I still terribly miss the one’s I did because I haven’t found anyone like them since. In 1996, I used AOL for the first time, and it was like life beginning. Here were thousands of people talking, sharing, experiencing and being themselves and they were a lot like me.
The internet was like social excursion for me in a place where I didn’t have to worry that I wasn’t good enough, or that I was being too much of myself. It has provided not only academic and social enrichment, but people into my lives I wouldn’t be the same without. I’ve kept in touch with a lot of people over the years that I probably wouldn’t have been able to before, even my friends from back home who I miss. I got my cats from the internet, who make each day fun and lighthearted. I met Neil on the internet before I ever met him in person.
So, even though it seems trite or silly to say that the internet has been my salvation, I’d be completely lying if I didn’t. Sure it hasn’t been perfect, it has its ups and downs like anything else. But I shudder to think what my earlier and present life would be like without it. Who would I have become, or settled to be, and what I’d be without. /tearygratefulrant.
So what is yours?
