>Yeah, I know what you mean. The world is gonna divide along lines of
>whether you're a 'computer person', or not -- like whether you're
>a smoker, or not... Some months ago, I think .mpa wrote that it was
>kinda disconcerting when he realized that the question of computer use
>was one of the first things to come up when making new acquaintances, and
>if the other person is a non-computer type, the possibility of friendship
>is limited... (or something like that -- apologies to Michael if I got
>that wrong)
Hmmm. Although its a vital part of my life, its not one of the first
things I think of to ask people that I view as potential friends. I'm
much more likely to try and discover what kind of games/sports they
like. It can be anything from cards to volleyball to fishing, but if
having "structured" fun isn't part of their life, we're not likely to
get along very well. (Of course I love "unstructured" fun too, but
usually people who don't have play time aren't likely to be much fun
in general)
> Email is _the_ way to go -
>>more immediate and intimate than snail mail, less confrontational and
>>demanding than a phone conversation (one-channel real-time).
>
>I agree. I'm gonna try to get my mom into it.
If you succeed, let me know how you did it. I've been trying too, but
its hard to get anything accomplished from 3000 miles away (which is
why its so importnant in the first place!)
>>When you're online, you can add the flourishes that create an illusion
>>of multi-channel communication - gestures, carefully crafted verbal
>>pictures...
>
>True, but there's another form of being 'online': ytalk. Immediate
>real-time communication. I may not have as much time to craft my words
>as carefully in ytalk as in email, but a distinct 'culture' does arise
>from it -- a "place" is created, and a way of being there is worked out
>among the participants. How do you know when somebody is done typing,
>for example?
Haven't used ytalk much. Only very rarely when I need to get in touch
with someone locally when I don't know the phone extension where they
are. I find it annoyingly slow and my spelling mistakes bug me. Never
been to a chat session.
[...]
>>This sounds like a spiritual awakening (I do not equate spiritualism
>>with religion btw). Belief in (or reliance on) the scientific method
>>can coexist with an awareness of a different "spiritual" (non-RL)
>>reality. People who have only one seem to me to be only half alive.
>>Without the former one is lost in ignorance and delusion, without the
>>latter one stifles to death in the prosaic banalities of daily
>>existance.
>>
>>Rational thought is necessary, but so (as you once said) are stories.
>
>Yes. We may be entering a time where Rational thought is put into its
>proper place, and room for the other half of being human is allowed to
>flourish. But I wouldn't divorce "spiritual" from RL, either. I've said
Neither do I! (Which I discussed in another post on this thread).
Balance is critical - Meat, Mind, and Muse.
>that I don't like making the distinction between "real life", and
>cyberspace -- that the distinction is really just for the sake of
>conversational convenience...
There's some truth in that but... Well, you said yourself that
something in you flourished when you first established yourself here,
and that Poly wasn't something you could (at least initially) be in
RL. Zeitgeyser has made similar comments, and I certainly have
experienced something of the same thing myself. There is something
"different" about being here.
Perhaps the actual difference is not so much that the conversation I'm
having now in my office is "real" and the conversation I'm having here
in alt.cp is "not real", but rather that the communication medium is
different, and the "persona" I have to present is different.
>People have always used the telling of stories to make sense of the world
>around them, of their experience in being alive. Right now, I think that
A personal coping mechanism of mine is to turn all of the important
events in my life into stories. They may never actually get told to
anyone, but if I can do that then I have dealt with and processed the
event enough to get on with things. Not being able to do that for a
given occurrance is a big warning sign that I'm repressing something
important.
>people are *starved* for the stories they need to help them understand
>what we are all going through here at the end of the second millenium of
>the common era. We all know that the rate of change is accelerating
>exponentially (or it feels like it, at least). Personally, I love
>American folk tales (Paul Bunyon, Pecos Bill, etc.)
Oh yeah. And books on myths and legends. Its amazing how the old
tales appear again and again in modern stories. (After reading the
Neiblungenleid (sp?) for example, certain modern fantasies never read
the same again).
>but those stories
>don't go very far in helping me understand what it means to have a
>physical reaction to text I'm reading on a screen written by somebody
>1600 miles away, for example.
Why is this different from having a physical reaction to text written
by someone who's been dead for hundreds or thousands of years? (Which
does happen to me as well)
>>Having 'room' is very necessary. The one time I tried to build a
>>'real home' it became a trap. Home is now a space that I create for
>>myself, spiraling out from the place I feel most safe at the time,
>>extending across time and space to places and people I care about -
>>both present and not, both living and dead.
>
>I should try to develop that attitude, then, as I'm pretty homeless at
>the moment. I mean, a corner of my sister's living room just isn't what
>I think of when I think of "home".
I get twitchy when the possessions I care about exceed what will fit
in my car. *Someday* when I have/build my *dream house* this may
change, but that's not going to be anytime soon. Its not important
enough to me to make it happen any time soon.
>Of course one tries to comprehend experience, to understand what one is
>going through, at the time of the event. I'm just saying that being here
>is so intense, and happening so fast, that it's just not possible to have
>had the amount of experience -- the passage of time required -- to see
>what it is that you've just gone through. My RL is like that too. I
>can't see where I've been until I'm past it somewhat, although I have an
>idea -- only the distance of time can allow me to see a period of my live
>clearly.
Ahhh, here you are drawing the distinction . Yes, one needs space
and time to fully understand what's happened and "what it all
meant". Sometimes you really just need to let go and stop trying to
understand to be able to continue. For the really big events
sometimes I literally "forget" until my dreams tell me that its time
(and its safe) to think and feel about it. (Every death of someone
close to me has been dealt with this way).
'Course this has a price too. When everyone else wants to deal with it
*right now* and you just want to get on with things until the
immediacy of the trauma fades a lot of hard feelings come up. This is
one of my approaches to life that no-one close to me has ever seemed
to accept (let alone understand).
[...]
>You've found a way to be here that is comfortable for you. Is that not
>enough?
Sometimes. Other times its not. Oh well, there's no time limit on or
criteria for participating. Whenever. However. Whatever. 'salright.
>>Speaking of which, Sym and I are about to go visit Zeitgeyser, who is
>>in serious need of some PB&Brimstone, on the porch...
>
>Yes, thank you for that. I'm sure it's much appreciated. He got pretty
>beat up.
Yup. Well, he does seem to be doing better now, benedictions on his
pointy little head