The illusion of friendship
The world is such a weird place. There are so many people in the world we'll never get to know. But suddenly, Internet appeared and we met unbodied minds, hidden by a fake name and an avatar. Then some people revealed themselves as either steady pictures or on short videos showing a glimpse of their being. What should we say now about such websites as Youtube or Twitch? You can now watch a person for such a long period of their own life, everyday perhaps, while they interact with their camera, knowing that strangers' eyes are watching them. It's so weird.
I was used to being emotionally involved in books, where characters might suffer and die, or experience love and happiness. I could see through the eyes of an abandoned dog and cry at his misfortunes. I could enjoy a journey in an imaginary world for some hundreds of pages. But then, it all faded to black once the book was closed, leaving some vague memory of a dream. Some feeling of emptiness that would go away after a while. Same goes for movies, games. I love to identify, experience by procuration what my life won't have. But once the T.V. is shut and the book closed, after some reverie, I can go back to my own world where none of this truly exist.
But this time, it's different. This time, it exists and doesn't at the same time. This time the character is a human being, in front of a camera, somewhere in the world. He talks to his camera, he interacts with the world. He doesn't see me, I didn't meet him and yet, I know him. I know his gestures and habits, I know his way of talking, what makes him laugh, cry or scream. I don't know all, but I know more about him than any of my own friends. I spent more time with him than my regular friends. I've even come to the point of wondering if love was involved somewhere. I know it's not, fortunately, because noone would ever replace my boyfriend in my heart. It's disturbing though. I see him as if he was just in front of me, staring into my eyes, talking to me. But, he isn't supposed to exist in my life, I don't have a place for him here. Each day, he’s here though. Each day, I can meet with him again. It's so easy. It's as if he was an imaginary friend. We hope he exists and we send him messages, to make sure. When he proves his existence by replying, it's the weirdest feeling in the world. It's as if it was a secret, a magic trick. We're happy but not completely satisfied. We want more. We want a real friend, with a body, here, in our daily life. We can't satisfy ourselves over some projection on a screen. I wanted to go away, because it was too heavy for me. So much time consuming, and always that feeling of emptiness at the end, because he's a friend I can't share. He's a friend that nobody I know acknowledges as real. In the mind of all, he's some kind of far away unknown celebrity. I wanted to let go. But I couldn't, because I have the feeling of abandoning a friend. It's so easy to relate to him, how could I let him down? After all, he's like my closest friend. I know it wouldn’t change much if I left him, but I just couldn’t. I've already experienced unrequited love, but never unrequited friendship. I guess meeting him in real life would be like being confronted to a friend suffering from Alzeimer. You know him, but he can't possibly know you. So you would just have this awkward moment, when confronted to a foreign gaze, you would just thank him and try to persuade him that he is an important friend of yours. But you would still be aware that, on a personal level, you can’t possibly have an impact on his life. He’s the illusion of a friend. And your belief in that illusion is what makes him exist. The Internet is such a weird place.
