3 years ago, I mocked a friend who spent sleepless nights chatting with friends she found on the internet. I told her it was unthinkable to find real people on the net as they were psychos trying to be nice and wanting to be your friend and later ask money from you. Oh, the horrible thoughts I could think of. For someone in technology, I am ironically cynical.
I still believe in some of the things I told her but a lot of it changed today.
Other than the people I work with, I do have a very select group of friends who I have known since elementary – classmates mostly and those I grew up with. We meet seldomly in a year but when we do talk, it always feels like the old times. It is always as if the now did not matter.
See, my friends have always been people who I have had met in school, my neighborhood and my work. I would never go to a party without knowing that a friend was there and I could chat with her without being left out. I would come in and leave un-noticed during gatherings. I am selectively shy. I am shy around my peers but never shy around children. I have all this insecurities that I can’t even seem to explain how on earth did it came about. (unexplainable)
But, faith has this way of mocking you back. I got to meet Lloyd’s girlfriend Zar back then. Zar introduced me to Multiply and I met THE Aileen Siroy. Aileen introduced me to her other friends and now the mocking is on me. I now spend late nights sharing photo assignments, reading other people’s blog, being excited about other people’s accomplishments, idolizing strangers (i have never met in person), and now I am even blogging.
Amazingly, faith had a way of making things fall into place at the right time. At a time when I have to make big decisions in my life, I am getting the “cheering” from the strangers I have just met through Multiply. And it indeed is making me change a lot of what I used to be.
Today, I still don’t know what to say at a party but I am now not afraid to meet strangers for the 1st time. Today, I got a sincere labor of love and show of friendship from someone who I used to stalk online for her brave and inspirational take on life (she even cooked a very special kind of sardines and included moist brownies with it). Thanks to this very beautiful person who is lovelier inside, who fulfills her promises and is my best cheerleader ever. Thanks to Beyond Normal. Today, I am not afraid to drive on roads I have never been to because someone in Singapore who I recently met in January is providing both the strength, love and craziness that I need for this trip. Thank to THE Bangs. =)
If friends are the family we create, I have created a very warm and loving family indeed and I found the sincerest Super Girls online. They lift you up, they invite you to meet their parents, they surprise you, they love you like you grew up with them your whole life, they accept you even if you make a booboo in life and they will cry with you too. The feeling of community and closeness has been very warm among people here and I am still amazed at how everyone seem so unbelievably kind. I have been an unbeliever but now I am fully converted.
I am now not afraid to say what I feel. I am now bold to talk about my insecurities. Que si hoda! I don’t even know what it means but I don’t care. I don’t care if I am not understood. This is my blog anyway. Que horror. I can write in german if that is what I fancy. I don’t need to belong to a “category”, young, old, ugly, pretty. There, I have said it. We are all specially and phenomenally wonderful.
I am also happy to find most of my friends from work and school online and I am happy to read their thoughts which would not have been possible when we meet otherwise. I am happy they share their accomplishments, their parenthood firsts, paranoias, and fears too.
I am reading my sister’s blog and I have never realized how much her work and space means to her. She is reading my thoughts too which makes it even. =)
I respect that some people sometimes say half truths because they want to keep some anonymity. I truly respect that.
The people I met online I believe have a deeper understanding of who I am because they are reading my thoughts as compared to assumptions I get when people start to try to understand me when they first meet me.
If this is how multiplied feels, then I will not only blog but multiply friendships online and offline. Lesson learned. No more mocking, okay?
I’m glad that I met my online friends at a time that really mattered. When and where I need them the most. My fears are now tucked in little jars that have long been covered six feet under the ground because you are there.
