Chapter One - 12th January

10.30 a.m. Monday 12^th January 2009

 First log in of the day. Three emails and two notifications. Read the emails first. One from Wonderlight, a band whose page I joined. They’re having a gig in Manchester next week. Won’t be going to that, seeing as I live in the South, and probably wouldn’t really make the effort to go and see them if they were playing only 20 miles away let alone a few hundred!. In fact, think I’d only go and see them if they were playing right on my doorstep and it was really cheap. To be honest, I only friend requested them because I wanted people to think I was up on the new music. Little do they know that behind closed doors nothing makes me sing along more than Billie Jean and the Masterplan!

 

Second email is from Jo. Continuing our recent email conversation about nothing and everything. What she did last night, who with etc. She went to the cinema with Ian, a guy she met online on Myspace (what we all used to use before Facebook) – it’s easier to meet strangers on there.  It’s more heathen. It didn’t start out that way, but being able to view everyone’s profiles whether you’re their ‘friend’ or not, and having a pretty open search facility soon led to the worldwide social networking site becoming a not so advertant dating site. I’m sure we’ve all been there. Facebook however is different – much more control over the privacy settings. I hardly get any requests from people I don’t know. I was a bit wary at first, you know, having to put in your surname instead of just a random alias. Instead of being ‘bubblemonkey’, I suddenly had to become the real live, living person that is Lisa Mather. Instead of being a virtual person, existing only in cyberspace amongst the wondering megabites and pixels, where I can post whatever I want and no one will know it’s me, unless they already know me, or know what I look like, for of course no profile would be complete without the token mobile phone picture, and pictures of all me and my mates having loads of fun. I remember the day when we didn’t even bother taking photos. Now it seems our cameras are a daily accessory – just incase something blogworthy happens during the day!

 

Anyway, Jo went out with Ian last night – it was the first time they’d met up ‘in real life’. Outside the realms of the internet. Did it go well? She wasn’t so sure. I don’t think he was quite what she expected.   Just two days ago we’d spent an hour on the telephone talking about how excited she was, and how he was such an interesting and funny person. Very caring and intelligent. I guess not knowing someone for real, and only seeing words on a page, you build up an image in your head of what they are like. An image that becomes distorted and twisted, and suddenly you find they’re your dream person, just sitting at the other end of a computer. 100 miles and a high speed asdl connection is all that stands between you. Well in Jo’s case it was only 10 miles for he lives in one of the surrounding villages, and her internet connection definitely wasn’t high speed.   But for a while he was definitely the love of her life. She was in love. Even I’ll confess that, and I’m such a cynic I think even Romeo and Juliet failed to moisten my eyes. But not in love with Ian. The brown haired, 5’8’’ tall IT Services Administrator who sat behind his laptop with The Kooks playing in the background in his messy bedroom in his shared house. But with Ian, the man who existed only in her head. Who, although he lived in a shared house, had a massive bedroom, decorated with candles and rose petals, just awaiting her arrival. The Ian who sat behind his computer everyday just to chat to her on instant messenger, and wasn’t also chatting to three of his friends and searching for dvd’s on ebay at the same time. The Ian who shared her every thought and feeling, and with whom she was sure she was destined to be. As it turned out, Ian, the IT Systems Administrator was not quite akin to her sentimental love searching, and had met several women from myspace that week, and was in fact in a competition with his friends to see who could meet the most women online, and take them out ‘in real life’. Plus, his voice was extraordinarily deep, not the soft, sensual sound she had imagined, and his conversation skills were limited by none. She had thought his slow responses on instant messenger were down to his lack of typing ability, and not his inability to formulate a sentence using more than one clause.

 

Guess I’d better write a response.

 

‘OMG Jo…that’s awful. I can’t believe after everything he turned out to be like that. What an idiot. Are you OK? Don’t let him get you down. You’re better than that. At least you found out what he was up to before it got too serious. ‘

 

Then some stuff about how she’s too good for him, and that he deserves to have the same type of thing happen to him, some general man negativity, and finishing with…

 

‘How did you find out? Have you said anything to him about it?’

 

Send.

 

Now, for the next email. From Claire Kennedy. I don’t recognise that name. Open.

 

‘Hi Lisa. 

I used to be Claire Bignall. We went to primary school together and you lived near me too. I’m married now, to Lee Kennedy – not sure if you remember him. He was my brother’s friend from St Giles School. He’s a lawyer now. How are you? Married, kids? What do you do for a living? I’m on a career break now as I’ve just had a little girl, Bethan (she’s so beautiful) but before that I was working as Manager of a Shelter for disengaged children, helping them cope with issues so that they could re-engage with their families. Would be great to hear from you.

Love C xoxo’

 

Wasn’t she the one that always had odd socks on and her mum used to pack fresh fish in her lunchbox that smelled awful? Oh God. She’s really successful. Married, daughter, career (and a worthwhile career too).   At least she wasn’t a looker. Let’s check out her photos. Oh great – she bloomed after primary school. She’s beautiful. Clear skin, great hair, so stylish. Damn it. I so want to hate this woman, but have no legitimate reason. Is being more successful and better looking than me a reason to hate someone. I mean. She sounds nice. Damn it. Why does this always happen. Another downfall of having to put your surname on facebook – people from your past catch up with you, and of course they all want to know what you’re up to now. Are they really interested, it seems only the successful who seem to ask what I’m up to. The rest just send me a friend request, but then I don’t hear from them. They probably just want to check out my profile and look at my pictures. See what I look like now. Are there any wedding photos, or photos of kids, or me on holiday in the Maldives in there? No – just me with friends, a boyfriend, having a picnic in a field, at a BBQ, on the beach in what is clearly England. Woo Hoo…she’s a loser too! Why can’t the past just stay in the past ? Why can’t I remember Claire as the girl at the front who always did her homework, and whose mum made gross food and never managed to wash her socks together? Why can’t Callum be the guy I used to sit behind in Maths, and not Manager of a bank, married to Sue who does charity work? Why can’t I be the average girl who was quiet, conscientious and inoffensive. Why do I have to become Lisa, the girl who grew up to work as a secretary, live with her boyfriend and not be able to afford to go on holiday. 

 

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not ungrateful for what I have. In fact, I’m very happy with my life, and love every minute of it. It’s just seeing it written down like that next to the words, doctor, married, is basically like saying ‘yes so you achieved all the base goals and ambitions we set when we were children, and your lives have followed a smooth course allowing you to end up in your early 30s completely content without a care in the world, while I sacrificed my dream of being a psychiatric doctor to spend most of my twenties hanging out with people that didn’t know me at school, drinking, wasting weekends shopping and working a job I happen to really enjoy just to pay off a mortgage on a two bed terrace house.’

 

Shall I reply? If I don’t it looks rude. I’ve nothing to hide. I’m proud of my life. So then why do I respond:

 

‘Hey Claire, great to hear from you. Sounds like you’re doing well. Congratulations on the new arrival. What is her name? Is she your first/only? How long have you been married? The job sounds very interesting, and very you.

 

I’m still living in the town, but have moved around a bit. I’m living near the centre now with my boyfriend. We own a house over near the Leisure Centre. It’s really handy for work and for going to the gym at the Leisure Centre. I work for one of the Managers of ABA Insurance. I’ve been there for about two years now. After school, I didn’t go to Uni, but travelled around a bit doing some temping work to try and build up a skillbase and experience different types of jobs before deciding what I wanted to do. After a few years I wanted to buy a house so took a permanent job at ABA where they trained me up and now I work for one of the Managers as his assistant.

 

Hope all continues to be well with you.

 

Take care. L.’

 

I’m not putting kisses. What’s with this whole ‘xoxo’ thing ? some kind of noughts and crosses game? How many x’s and o’s are appropriate?  Two for an acquaintance? Five for friends? It’s too confusing. I’ll just stick to L.

 

Let’s see what she makes of that. Of course, if you read between the lines you’ll work out that travelling around a bit means moving from one side of town to the other, to live with some friends, and then when that didn’t work out moving to another house with some other friends, then moving 10 miles away to live with an ex, for six months before moving back and renting my own flat for a while. Temping to try and build up a skillbase and experience different types of jobs – more like moving around from job to job because each one drove me more crazy and bored than the previous. Manager’s assistant – secretary to you and me!

 

Now to the notifications. A friend request from Claire. Of course. Accept – naturally. Can’t reply to an email and not accept. The second –oooh, Elle’s tagged me in a photo. Wonder what that is. Oh god. It’s one from her birthday last summer. I look deformed. Have you noticed that when you’re posting up your own photos, you only put up ones of you that look good, all the others go in the delete bin, but when you’re posting photos of your friends, who cares who inbred they look? As long as you look popular. I know so and so looks awful in this and would hate me for posting it up, but I’ve got no other pictures of us together and I have to have a picture of me with all my friends so everyone knows they are my friend! Oh well. I suppose it shows I do have some semblance of a life!

Reviews

[Bhavya Kaushik]

Wow! What a plot I must say...A very unique piece of writing it is.....
About facebook and how we relates to it, very well written!

[perfectlymetiKulous]

LOL... amazing. This is a great write. I read it and I think, "this is what I go through every day on Facebook" -- reconnecting with people I know from way back when, and then, talking my friends down off the ledge, etc. :) I love your style of writing. I can't wait to read more of your work.