against my better judgment and towards a more complete isolation, i joined an "online community." from the get go i had an odd feeling like i was forfeiting any right to actual closeness to living and breathing three dimensional beings for a life of megahertz, bits, bytes and the pitterpatter of so many typed numerals and letters upon my screen. and yes i recognize the irony in the electronic medium i am using to express these feelings of alienation. this is not to say that there are not worthwhile connections to be made when the variable of distance has been eliminated from the concept of communication, but i cannot help but think of o so many kids sitting in their dimly lit apartments in front of a desk gazing so fondly into the face of this automated man without arms or legs. filling out a profile for an "online community" makes me think of the people who fill out "friendship" ads in the fusac or personals in the thrifty nickel.

i looked at the guestbook of my friend’s band and saw a girl from new york had signed it. i looked at her site and signed her guestbook. she emailed me with something along the lines of "I saw you signed my guestbook, who are you?" I responded with a message about my friend and his page and the degrees of separation between georgia, alabama and new york. this is how she responded: "Do you have a pic?" keep in mind that these are emails which can have some semblance of actual personal correspondence at times. i sent her a picture of myself that my friend andrew took, and never heard from her again. perhaps i’m not handsome enough and so i don’t meet her teen magazine expectations of independent music. o well.

besides that, i met an english/irish girl that writes translated swedish words next to yellow shirted pictures of herself. this through above mentioned "online community." she taught me to say some things in irish, but i don’t remember how to say them, or rather how they’re written. i saw her picture on my school’s screen and traded poorly spelt articles and lowercased letters with her for a while. she seemed slightly scandinavian and full of mystery. it is quite possible that she’s a little bit mean...which makes me smile.