As a blogger and social media explorer, I inhabit the virtual world of the Internet on a daily basis. In a sense it’s really not virtual because real relationships and connections are made. But the people I meet online are usually known only by an avatar, a name, a few words of comment, and perhaps a blog of their own. Real people, but filtered through digital media — as am I.
So it is always a good, though unsettling experience, to connect with these same folks without the filter of digital media. This happened to me several times this week …
- the host of a radio show read my comments, emailed me, then called me to see if I’d chat about the Miss Sister 2008 beauty pageant
- an actor playing the role of a nun contacted me so that she could portray the nun as authentically as possible
- a blogger whom I respect was at my place of ministry (When I met Julie D. of Happy Catholic that M&M commercial flashed through my mind where the M&Ms run into Santa and they say, “He DOES exist!”)
It takes a little getting used to because as with any filtered encounter (a picture, a website, a comment) one creates an image of the person in one’s mind — perfectly normal. But then when you learn more about the person, have an actually encounter with the flesh-and-blood person, it changes everything. Even a brief encounter with a real, live person can be so much more powerful than the virtual persons we are on the Internet. It gives me pause to think about how much our persons, our very presence communicates about who we are. It’s really quite cool and quite beautiful.
"She wrote the way she lived: on the fly, without retrospect, always on the way, climbing higher."