Sigue

• This is blog post is long and has nothing to do with anime. You will not be interested in reading it. You have been warned.

 I can't deny that I spend much more time on the internet than I probably should. While I do go out and spend time face-to-face with my friends, our different schedules and distance from one-another, combined with lackluster public transportation on evenings and weekends and the bitter cold of winter limits our get-togethers to weekends and public holidays, when we can spend enough time together to justify the effort of assembling in one place. Thus, most of our interaction happens via instant messaging with the occasional phone call. Because of the time I've spent online, whether it be on forums, games or chat room, I've met a few people that I genuinely enjoy spending time with.

The irony in all this is that I find myself becoming closer and closer to the people I've met online, to the point where I begin to feel as attached to them as I do to people that I have met physically - I hesitate to use the term "in real life", because the people I've met online are no less real than those I've seen in the flesh. At this point in time, I have more "friends" online than I do in real life thanks to a combination of "anti-social" behavior and general dislike of people. Because of this, I often find myself at odds with older family members and acquaintances that have a more "normal" social life who would challenge my use of the word "friend."

What, then, defines a friend? Are they limited to physical acquaintances? While I would agree that you often become closer to people you're around physically, I cannot discount the people I've met online over the years as mere acquaintances. With how easy it is to ignore people on the internet, I can easily limit my interaction so that it happens primarily with people who I want to interact with, in stark contrast to my recent physical interaction with people. While I treasure my friends, I often come home after a night out knowing that I would have enjoyed myself more at home, at the computer. It isn't that I regret spending time with my friends - I enjoy spending as much time with them as I can. The problem lies with their "friends", or rather their use of the word "friend." The more I observe the people around me, the more I realize that in today's society, the words "friend" and "acquaintance" are virtually interchangeable. The end result is that the people that others consider friends are much less pleasent to be around than I would have expected from someone a friend of mine considers a friend.

To me, a friend is somebody I trust, not simply someone I met at a party and got added to their Facebook or MSN contacts. A friend is something precious - I care about them and they care about me, and we enjoy the time we spend together, regardless of physical proximity, age, race, gender, etc. To others, a friend is anyone you would hang out with - the most socially promiscuous of my friends would argue that his "friends" are more real than my online friends, regardless of the trust I place in them and the time I spend with them, simply because I've never met them in person. I prefer to believe this isn't the case - good people are hard to come by, and one should treasure them regardless of how you meet them.