19 Apr
Guest Post: The Beauty of Internet Friends
Hi, That Wife readers! I’m Molly and I write over at These Little Moments. I was so honored when Jenna asked me to guest post for her…and then I totally procrastinated. Guest blogger FAIL. It’s currently 8 a.m. on Sunday, April 11th and if you’ve been following Jenna’s Twitter page, you know that she’s been experiencing contractions! I’m am SO excited for That 1 to arrive, and not just because I think Jenna is amazing (I do!). It’s also because I sort of feel like I’ve been sharing this journey with Jenna, as I’m 28 weeks pregnant with my first child.
I started reading Jenna back when she was That Bride. I was planning my own October 2008 wedding, and I found a real connection with her through her words. Slowly, through mutual comments on each other’s blogs, then emails, an internet friendship was born.
When I started blogging four years ago, the idea of making friends over the internet was considered weird. Creepy, even. As my circle of friends expanded to include writers who I found I had worlds in common with, my “real life” friends had trouble understanding why I was writing lengthy emails to, having lunch dates with, and even attending weddings of women I met through a blog.
Eventually, I started introducing the two worlds together, and not surprisingly, both worlds combined easily. It doesn’t surprise me at all. I’ve surrounded myself with amazing people in my life…and I’ve met some of them on the internet!
I’ve never “met” Jenna. I was secretly hoping she and TH would be relocating to Boston — as it’s only an hour and change from me — and we’d finally be able to get together. Alas, Chicago will be their new home. But that won’t stop me from writing to her, celebrating her new baby and sharing in her joy. What I enjoy most about this internet connection, is that while we have similarities, Jenna and I are so very different. I often don’t agree with what she writes, but I read in earnest because I find it interesting. Plus, we both really like red shoes. 
Congratulations, Jenna. I am so thrilled for this time in your life.
Have any of you formed internet friendships? How did they go over with people in your “real life”?
Also:
I'm a farm-raised almost-crunchy stroller-pushing picture-taking lifestyle-blog-writing gastronomy-obsessed divine-seeking thrift-store-combing cheese-inhaling pavement-pounding laughter-sprinkling lover of individuality and taking chances.
I’ve met several friends that started out as online acquaintances (including my husband!) But my oldest online friendship started back in 1999! I started writing online at a site called opendiary when I was just 15 years old. I met a girl on there who also kept a diary (I don’t even know that the word “blog” existed then!), and she lived in Canada. We read about each others’ lives every day, and found that we had so much in common. We then started chatting outside the diary site on a regular basis. We would also exchange bday or holiday cards with each other. At one point, we decided that whenever we got married, we’d make the trek to each others’ towns and finally meet. After an engagement on her part and mine (both ultimately ending up in us breaking up with our significant other, thus no wedding…) she decided we couldn’t wait til a wedding, she was going to roadtrip down here with a friend of hers & we were finally going to meet, 10 years after we initially found each other online! It takes a lot of faith to pack up & drive 12 hours to visit/stay with someone that you’ve never even talked to on the phone, but she did it! We had a great time! She stayed about 5 days and I showed her what the states were all about, including a trip to Chicago! I’m planning a trip up there next summer for her wedding, (she wasn’t actually able to travel down here again for mine, but that’s OK!) and I couldn’t be more excited!
I think that those that find online friendships a little out of the ordinary just haven’t found that connection with someone via the internet like many others have! Nowadays, this is just one more way to connect with other people, and I don’t find a thing wrong with it:)
1I love my internet friends I have met IRL, and my sister thinks it’s mega-weird. I don’t see anything wrong with it - I try really hard to make friends with similar interests outside of law school, and I think the internet majorly helps with that.
2Good job first Guest Poster!
Yes, when I talk about my online friend, Jenna, I often get a funny look from my husband, but I then tell him that he will meet her *someday*. Someday we will be in the same town for more than 24 hours and I will have her take our pictures. Then he’ll meet her and I’ll just say “You know, my friend Jenna” - but without the quizzical look.
BTW, my husband and I L-O-V-E Boston and that whole area. I wish WE were relocating there! Landon is in the military, so hopefully someday we’ll get to go to Hanscom because we fell in love with the city and the all the cool places outside the city.
3Great guest post, Molly!
I’ve never met a blogger in person… But I sure know how my friends would feel about it. They would think it’s weird. I actually blog anonymously (as anonymously as possible) and no one except my husband knows I do it. But I’ve heard friends/family members comment on how weird blogging is. And I think my husband - who is very supportive - even secretly thinks it’s a little odd to have friends you’ve never met.
4Blogging and online friends were my life savers when I moved to the US to be with my then boyfriend (now husband), I couldn’t work, didn’t have a car to drive and was stuck with dial up because we lived in the boonies.
I can honestly say it helped me stay sane to have people I could “talk to” while I was in that situation.
Now I’ve never met any blogger but I’m hoping I will sometimes. Maybe an other expat as we are a bit of a tight community sharing a similar experience.
5One of my cousins, still in France met so many other blogger and I envy her experience. Some became really good friends.
My husband probably thinks its weird from time to time but he knows I love to write so he lets me stay hours on the computer without complaints.
I have never been able to make the leap from “blog” to “real life”. I would really like to, but I am not sure what it takes. I do talk to my hubby about Jenna having her baby though.
6I think that when the internet first got started as being accessible in the home, there was a small pool of people who jumped on the bandwagon first, and so if you heard of someone meeting a date online, or making friends online, it struck people as weird because it was so rare- I mean, I didn’t get a myspace profile until I was 22!. But as social networking has gotten more mainstream- to the point where everyone has a facebook, a flicker, a blog, etc.- then everyone you know has met someone online, or has a blog, or keeps up with family on facebook. Once the pool of people participating tipped from minority to majority, it naturally became more acceptable to make friends online, to meet partners online, to go on dates and even to marry someone you met, originally, online. It’s seen as just what people do these days, whereas perhaps 10 or even 5 years ago it was something just *some* people did, and it seemed foreign.
Great post
7Since blogging for Weddingbee, I have made so many internet friends! & a lof of these girls are truly my friends, whether I’ve met them in real life or not
8The majority of my friends have never heard of Dooce or ever read a blog - and so most don’t even know I’m blogging (and enjoy it so much!). It is just too hard to explain. Last week, I met my first blogger in “real” life. Somehow, the 2 of us ended up in a small (16 ppl?) seminar together. Crazy! I actually don’t know how I feel about the possibility of world’s colliding - confused? - and it’s good to hear others have gone through similar things.
9I have several internet friends (I call them blog buddies) whom I’ve never met, but with whom I feel very close. Some of us have been reading each other’s blogs for years, some of us are newly connected via Twitter (via other friend’s blogs, etc), heck, some I’ve met because I liked their comments on a friend’s blog and started reading their blogs too. I love the internet for its ability to connect people, and I really do feel lucky to have met some truly wonderful people …even if we’ve never met in person.
10Long before we all had blogs and FB accounts I had penpals. My most serious “boyfriends” in my earlier dating years were through emails and letters. For me, it didn’t translate…the two, no three, guys that I wrote “seriously” for significant periods (before ever meeting them…they were “set-ups” of sorts) of time had me swooning in the letters, but even though there WAS initial chemistry in person with them, it never reached the same level of relationship in person as it did through the written word. The most dramatic real-life meeting was in the Cloisters in NYC… Although they didn’t end up being super significant in the long run, they definitely filled a need for me in the moment and I don’t regret those relationships one bit.
As far as personality over the blog vs in real life, I do know Jenna in real life and in person she is much more reserved than she is here. I love the way blogs help us get to know people on a deeper level. I feel like I am able to show people more of my “real” self through my blog…things that might not be apparent in person. I usually just read blogs of people I know with a few exceptions like PW and NieNie and my blog is written for the people who know me personally and I have picked up a few friends who I have never met in real life along the way.
I was listening to some talk radio program the other day and they were discussing how if not managed correctly, our online friends can take up a disproportionate amount of time vs our “real life” friends and family who may need our time and attention even more. Which is why I need to sign off right now and work on some Mother’s Day presents:)
11Jenna is my first (and only?) blog friend. I felt so silly about it at first and my husband teased me about it initially, but now he asks questions about her and things that are going on (like her birth experience, he keeps asking for updates & clarifications, some of which I can’t provide yet! =D). And Katy, I’m totally with you… I know one day I’ll end up meeting Jenna. I think my husband has already advanced to the level of expecting that though.
I think Rebecca is right, that somehow it’s like pen pals from our childhood, just on a more immediate level.
A lot of the people I’m “friends” with on Facebook are people I know, though many of them are from years ago and some are more acquaintances than close buds. I have had a few comment on my fb page about things I’ve only blogged about, or else they specifically mention my blog (which is linked in fb). I think sometimes those “friendships” are akin to those made in the blogosphere simply because a lot of those people don’t know me well at all, but they get to know me and catch up to what I’m doing in life NOW via the internet.
Does that make sense??
Rebecca Reply:
April 20th, 2010 at 12:35 am
Yes! That makes total sense! I agree! I have some friends on FB like that too.
I am the kind of stalker blogger (in a non scary way). I’ve been reading Molly and Jenna since before their weddings but I don’t leave comments and I don’t really interact. I feel like I know them but I don’t think they know who I am…
Ok, that sounded scary… but I promise I’m not.
I just like to read about other people…
OMG! scary again.
I don’t think there is a way to explain without sounding like a nutcase!
and that’s why I don’t comment that often…
13When I got engaged, I found The Knot and the local message board for my city. Though I met many wonderful women at get togethers, I really connected with a few.
We are now a group of 8 who chat everyday via gmail. We have at least one get together each month, with mini meetings in between. We attended each others weddings and helped each other move. They’re such a source of encouragement and support and friendship.
Some of my ‘real life’ friends had trouble at first with the idea, but they’ve come around.
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