Getting Out, Meeting People

If the television can be trusted, meeting people met first online ends, without fail, in your 15 minuets of fame being a 2 minuets cautionary tale on the 10 o’clock news. Just ask my family; they’ll tell you the same. And I can’t say I’m not very leery of it as well and I do think for some good reasons.

When I came out as a teen, I had not one of the internets (;-)), but we did have creepy strangers, who’d hang around where we hung, with whom you’d not want to find yourself alone. We had closeted gay men, married men posing as out gay men just to live a fantasy. We had people posing as an understanding ear for the vulnerable, either out to “save” us from or “help” us live with our orientation, but who were only out to take advantage. And none of them could conceal their nature as easily as they can now, online. I’d absolutely say to watch out for such; I and the TV are sure they’re out there still.

Through my life I’ve never really found myself thinking I’d actually meet any of the people I’d met online, save for one other time, for the above reasons. Oddly, looking back, most the people I’d like to have met have been those I’ve debated most :-). But now, here, with much of this blogography associated with my same geography, it’s come up. I think also it’s come up because there are some really good folks here. I’ve come to respect, and internet-ly know some to the point that it feels natural to want to drive a bit and chat in person, as I would with any other person I’ve come to appreciate in my every day activities. I simply did not anticipate feeling such would be okay when I entered these blogs with my first comment, but, in short, it can and has (in a public place at first, of course, always with R, and not until after we’ve interacted for a while, and… :-)).

Fortunately, I can say it’s been well worth it. I’m as glad to have met offline as on, and more. It really is nice to put a face to the avatars, and to the personality coming through in text. It’s nice to let down a bit of my guard, talk comfortably person-to-person, and get past some of the unwieldy but purposeful cloak and dagger of this area of the gay world. But it’s been particularly appreciated to find a better way to involve R. If you’ve not noticed by now, R barely gets his email and has little interest in anything computer-y (too many made-up words per post?); I deal with the electrical, and he deals with the rest ;-). To be able to give him a better idea, in a way that he can better interact, about the whos and whats of these blogs has been appreciated. And at least now some of you out there could vouch for our real-world existence ;-).