What WOULD I Do Without the Internet?

My mentor, Elinor, once asked me a very difficult question for which, I have not really had much in the way of a satisfactory answer. She asked me, “What would you do without the Internet?” and she kept asking me this question over the past few weeks of my surgery as I have been counting down the days to the surgery. Once my income and livelihood came from doing web design and I would have probably answered that question with one word, “Starve”. I never really meant that since I have had jobs that I really hated, such as working in fast food and at a gas station where I was accused of stealing $1,000 of merchandise because I trashed the receipt I had for a sandwich I was eating behind the counter. But now, I am a student and I have given up the hat of professional web designer, never again to don it because it just no longer holds my interest. But I still read blogs and webcomics and I am still a gamer at heart. I piss away an obscene amount of time on the Internet and I need to learn how to interact in the real world and work with real people doing things that I enjoy.

The Internet served a purpose throughout my teen years, when I purchased my first computer after working for quite a while. I had always wanted my own computer and was sick and tired of having to go to the library to use the computers, both due to the infrequency of it as my mum could not spend TOO much time sober enough to drive and the restrictions using someone else’s computer comes with. But when I got my computer, I was on it every waking moment when I was at home. It was the perfect little hiding place for me to avoid a family that I needed so desperately to stay away from. They were (and still are) very toxic people and I knew that I had to ride out the next few years and try to avoid getting too badly beaten or killed by them. I guess that is how I was able to cultivate the skills to really do some awesome things on the web, nothing else to do really. Never watched telly or played games with my family so I did things like learn HTML, PHP and CSS. In short, an answer to that question for that moment is that I would have probably gone insane or died at the hands of my overly violent father. I would have probably become a toxic person like my father and raise a family that I would eventually treat like shit, like he has.

I also talked to other people and created many connections with some very wonderful people that I met through common interests. I was a member of the online Pokemon communities and I talked with a number of people that held my intense interest. In fact, one of my exes was one of the webmasters I befriended when I was talking with the pokemon community. I am still in touch with a few of the people I befriended in the Pokemon community and they had become like friends to me. This was very important to someone who had to tiptoe around the house to avoid making noise to indicate that I was out of my room, because they had accusations that I had taken money from them (which is a side effect of the drugs, probably). As a result, I am reluctant to give up the Internet as it has helped me out in a time of my life where I really needed it. I am banned from a few Pokemon forums due to clashes of personality and I understand why I am banned and will comply with those bans.

When I was questioning my faith and trying to figure out what I would do now that I am no longer a Christian, I turned to the Internet and I was presented with a plethora of options. I could have chosen one of the kookier religions, like Scientology, but I wound up in Buddhism and then I became a Wiccan Buddhist after much thought and introspection. I am an atheist by virtue of the fact that I do not believe in any of the gods that man has invented over the years, but I also believe that Wicca and Buddhism are ethical religions that I could believe in while maintaining reason and logic. But being raised in Southern Texas, I would have probably never found out about these and except for the fact that I was living a stone’s throw away from a Buddhist monastery in Calgary, Alberta, I could have found out about Buddhism. But the addition of Wiccan ideas and values was due to my own research of Wicca on the Internet and I am very happy that I had found it.

I also figured out I was a transsexual thanks to a thorough discussion I have had with a friend of mine. I found a number of personal stories and accounts of transition to say “Oh my god, these people have felt the same way I feel”. I had just come out of a life of repression in the Christian faith so I was ripe for accepting the fact that yes, I am a transsexual woman. It was the Internet that helped me figure out that Houston not only has a trans community but also has some pretty wonderful, fascinating people in that community. I made some really good friendships with people in Houston and plan to travel back there to visit with the people that I really care about. These are people that would take me in if I needed it, which was demonstrated when I was having issues with Southwest Airlines. But I would have never met these people if I did not know that there was a transsexual community in Houston and for that, I am grateful.

It was the Internet that told me about Naropa University and led me to move to Colorado because without that idea, I would have never considered Denver as a suitable place to live. I just thought that it was just another city in the Midwest and like Kansas City, it would be a nasty place to live. Turns out that Denver is a very nice place to live and I am quite fortunate to be living in Colorado, even though I would rather be living along the Canadian rockies instead of the American rockies. I have kept a suitable distance from my family in Texas while living in a place where the general population, for the most part, accepts me for who I am. In Texas, you can only have the gender on your driver’s license changed with a court order or surgery, but in Colorado, it’s just a form that you can have filled before or after surgery. Also, there are some really beautiful places in the Denver Metro Area to live and I am thinking about living in Conifer if I cannot immigrate to Canada in the future. And I would have never moved here if I did not have the Internet.

But now, I lead a life where happiness is a possibility, but only if I work at it and have enough intention to improve my life. And one of the things I really need to do is stop making the Internet or things to do on the Internet the centre of my life. I know for a fact that it is a bit more difficult to do if one has online courses, like I most assuredly will when I work on my doctoral degree (hey, Palo Alto is beautiful but horribly fucking expensive, sue me). Of course, I still intend to blog and perform a few online activities, but I have to cut down and actually meet with real people in the here and now. Meeting people online has not been a fruitful experience, as I have met a lot of losers online and I guess I really was not expecting that. I knew that the Internet had some pretty unsavory people on it, but I truly and genuinely thought that I was meeting people who were with it and together. I was not expecting perfection, but at the very least, they could function in a relationship.

The Internet has consumed so much of my life that I have few friends in real life, living breathing friends. I am somewhat antisocial and I hang out in a place where there is a computer or a wireless connection but I have no reason to now. I have the life I want, albeit a few things could be added to make it better, such as a husband. But right now, I am quite content with the life I lead except for the fact that I need to go out, do more things and be less boring. I never developed any real interests when I was online all the time and while I know I want to dance and read under trees, these things still do not constitute enough interests in the physical realm. How do I find real life interests that I could enjoy with others? I am afraid to say it, but it looks like the answer to this question is – the Internet, and human observation of course.

In short, I do not know what I would have done if I were born in a time that I did not have the Internet. If I were born before the era of sex reassignment surgery, I would have probably killed myself and kept trying until it was done. But I do know that it is very important for me to figure it out because I have a life to live and it would be such a waste of money to transition if I am not living and enjoying the life that I have now. Of course I still plan to blog and keep doing some of the things I want to do online, but I am not going to be totally obsessed over it like I have been over the past few years. I have the capability to build a network of friends in my own backyard, all I need to do is get out there and play.

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Tags: computers, dangers, enjoy life, get a life, interests, internet, life, purpose, real life, transition, transsexual