random thoughts from a random mind

I think I may be the literary equivalent of a travelling hobo.

The internet is scattered with my ideas and thoughts - on a social networking site here, a journal there, a website here, a news-blog there. I once wondered how many postings i have done in my lifetime, and the idea scared me - in theory, almost every thought i have ever had, as irrelevant as it may now be (or was at the time, to be honest) is stored somewhere on the world.wide.web, floating through cyberspace, just waiting to be read by some accidental clicker.

Most of the thoughts I’ve shared with complete strangers I wouldn’t have, at the time, shared with my closest ‘real-life’ friends – which I suppose is how some of these same ‘complete strangers’ have also become my closest real-life friends.

They were with me when I got my first ‘real’ boyfriend, at the tender age of 15; when I parted with him to move away to Armidale (the end.of.the.world. as we knew it, at the time); when I had to make the heart-wrenching decision to say “thats enough”, and move on from him; when I then had my own heart broken some 10 months later; when I finally escaped student hell; when i got my first corporate job; and finally, when I at last discovered what love ACTUALLY was.  

When I couldn’t speak for choking, adolescent grief, but my fingers still worked – they were there.  When my parents were the absolute worst in the world for making an annoyingly reasonable decision, and I wanted to scream bloody murder, but found bashing the keyboard worked just as well – they were there. When i wrote the most despicable teenage poetry, complete with saucepan-crashingly obvious metaphors for life and death – they were there (and the darlings never let on what an ignorant prat i was, either).

I have stored almost 11 years of my life on an ‘online journal’, password protected to keep nosy parkers out (no joke – I’ve even had it hacked – who knew my thoughts were worth that?), and  shared in other’s personal ups and downs  via their own entries. 

I cried when a friend documented her struggle with ovarian cancer, and her heartbreak when she was told she would never have the children she so desperately wanted – but I cried even harder when she announced she and her husband were expecting. She had a horrendous pregnancy, full of excruciating pain and fear that she or her child may not survive the birth. Despite all the complications, the baby was born, and he was beautiful, he still is, and he now has a gorgeous little sister. I couldn’t be happier for her. The funny part? This ‘friend’ lives in America – i have never met her. In fact, I don’t think I even know her last name.  

Another friend I knew only as a screen-name for four years -  until I took a most random trip to her city for her birthday. She wasn’t even a friend of a friend, but a friend of another ’screen-name’ who i had also communicated with by email for years before agreeing to visit. I have to admit to feeling trepidation before the meeting (who wouldn’t?), but the second I met those girls in the flesh, I felt like I really knew them. Maybe because I did - I could tell you where they worked, who they had dated, what their most embaressing moments were, how they really felt about their ‘real-life’ friends, and how they felt about me (if they didn’t like me, they would have just deleted me from their Friends List. Don’t you wish you could do that in real life?) I probably knew more about them than their own families.

That girl is now one of my best friends in the world – and despite our geographical differences , I speak and connect with her more often than almost anyone else I know.

So then, why have I abandoned my previous online journal?

Like anything else in life, things online change. I began that journal when I was in year 9. Thats a long time in net-years – long enough that I no longer identify with the screen-name I chose when i was 14, long enough that most of the people on my Friends List no longer update, long enough that I feel embaressed to admit most of my older entries are peppered with “lol”s and “OMG”s.

I feel its time to make a fresh start – the online equivalent to buying a new diary, and smoothing your hand over the crisp, lined, unmarked pages whilst breathing in the new paper scent.

This is the mark on the first page – the blathering, random thoughts of a most random mind.