Nobody’s found a way behind your defenses
They never notice the zap gun in your hand
Until you’re pointing it and stunning their sensesBilly Joel
“Sleeping With The Television On”
[post updated--- see end]
In the course of the existence of this site, I have had a number of correspondents and commenters. In recent weeks, I have communicated with one of them many times off-site, through email and other means. She (interestingly, most of the commenters on SG appear to be female) recently suggested that we could be friends in the “real world”— a seemingly solid response to a loneliness that affects each of our lives.
I thought about it, and it struck me just how much the usefulness of this site depends on my anonymity. I knew this when I started of course, but had begun to forget as our correspondence grew. Despite her assurance that she would “keep [my] secrets”, I am quite sure that if I ever came to believe that anyone knew my true identity, I would have to shut down the site. At the very best, I would cease posting on it.
The reason, simply stated, is that I would not be able to be open anymore. Anonymity allows me to be blunt in ways I simply could not if I were known. Putting it another way, if this site is to be of any use to me I have to be willing to be an asshole. I have to be able to write without any concern about what somebody— anybody— out there might think about it. Commenters? Cool. Friends? Fuck off. (And if that offended you, you’re probably too close. Funny how it sneaks up on you.)
There is an unavoidably twisted irony to all of this, of course. This site exposes me the exactly the type of people I should probably be trying to find, but the nature of what draws them here makes that exact connection an impossibility. My life often seems full of these types of vicious cycles.
That it’s frustrating goes without saying. I hope I haven’t driven off my regular readers (all two of you), but ultimately I can’t do anything about that. My life stinks, if you haven’t noticed.
After a while solitude feels like an old friend— one, however, who beckons me in a bad direction.
[update: I'm strongly tempted to remove this post, or water it down some. In recent years I've watched an older relative toss aside lifelong friendships; basically he's turning into the stereotypical "bitter old man", and I wonder if in a way the same thing is happening to me. Nonetheless I stand firm in the belief that it would be a bad mistake to reveal myself to anyone--- especially someone who might, in theory, later meet other people I know in my "real" life.]
“I have to be able to write without any concern about what somebody— anybody— out there might think about it. Commenters? Cool. Friends? Fuck off. (And if that offended you, you’re probably too close. Funny how it sneaks up on you.)”
HAHAHA. I have been feeling like that a lot lately but for a different reason. Or maybe the same one.
It seems like … what I most want is emotional intimacy. But every time I try, it goes terribly wrong. They’re not as intense as I am and don’t get my feelings at all. They interpret me as someone else who is more common, and are unable to see the real me. They become intimidated by my abilities and are quiet whenever we talk. Or they’re as intense as I am — but they’ve never figured out how to express that, so they are perpetually shy. Every time I try to get the emotional intimacy I need… what people have to say to me tends to be absolutely the wrong thing. Or silence. I could hang myself in that silence.
I just told a friend (politely) to fuck off simply because he reminded me of what it is like to feel alive and fall in love. I couldn’t handle it. I don’t want to be reminded of something that might not be possible for me, so vividly. I do understand your attitude.
I have two ideas and don’t mind at all if you blow them to bits with a shotgun and stomp on the pieces:
1. If you make a friend you can talk to about everything, you won’t need the site anymore. Obviously you’d have to verify that the other person’s friendship looked pretty stable, but if real friendship looked possible, trading the site for that might be worth it.
2. If you made a message board site you could just change your handle whenever you wanted to refresh your anonymity and just never mention to anyone that you run the site.
Now I am wondering if “Fuck off” was a directive. It came across like an expression of emotion the first time I read it. So I figured I’d better find out if you want me to actually fuck off. If that’s the case, I will go away, and all you need to do is say so clearly and unambiguously.
[note: I wrote this reply after reading only the immediate comment this replies to. All others from the same day were caught in the spam box. Now I'm off to read the rest....]
Hells bells She — if I knew what I wanted this site wouldn’t be here.
Can you see what the problem is? I write here because I have the freedom to say what I need to say— but then if I start forming relationships or even friendships I lose the ability to speak without worrying about who I’m going to offend, or whatever. My life, and frankly, mental state, is not pretty.
And if somebody knows who I am, I would never be able to get past the fear of revelation. NOT telling people is what has kept me alive all these years. So the suggestion of meeting face-to-face with a reader became a delayed-reaction freakout. The last week has been a very dark one, and I think it’s partially because this has put me off balance.
But the site is a good thing, as it is, and the conversation is good as well, and useful. I can write it all on water if nobody’s listening. Please do stick around, but accept that I will probably never (on purpose) actually meet anyone who knows about this site.
And if things get ugly, don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Shorter version: Stick around, but wear a raincoat.
I do understand the desire for anonymity. I used to enjoy the internet for that reason, before everything became a huge, interconnected social network. :/
I can’t say I know exactly what would happen in your situation if your family found out, but I can imagine that it would be a mess, definitely. There are people that I won’t talk to about these things.
What kind of ugliness should I be expecting?
I acknowledge that the following suggestion is probably useless because even if you used it and it worked, you still would not want to talk to the person about these kinds of things. So feel free to stomp it:
If a person you have met here has any type of hangout place online, you could go there and present yourself as an entirely different, unrelated person. “Meet” them all over again.
Well, for starters, there’s been some naughty language….