Recently I realized I've effectively disconnected from the internet. Online spaces used to be the primary way I socialized, met new friends, opened up to people, roleplayed. But the spaces I used to occupy are gone. The events I used to attend are over. The people I used to talk to are all gray offline names on my contact list, or they've simply moved on with their lives. I haven't roleplayed meaningfully in three years, and yet I carried on believing I would just "get back into it" next week or the week after that. I've always played ff14 alone. In Shadowbringers this weird, magical time when we were all in lockdown made the community strangely vibrant and, for a time, I rode that high--but that's over too, and the people I met along the way are either gone now, or just people I say hello to every now and again as we assure ourselves that "we should do something together sometime." Letting go feels bittersweet. The sweetness comes from the relief. Accepting that something's over and never coming back, but being grateful that it happened. My time online is over. Even if I log into the game to play alone or take some screenshots or even attend the odd roleplaying event, or if I log into discord to chat a little about a game I'm playing or joke around with someone, these are just the quotidian day-to-day activities that punctuate solitude. There's nothing coming around the corner except more of the road I'm already walking. There's no real tomorrow except the rest of today, rushing irreducibly into the past.
