I think my parents still don't realize I wasn't actually 'busy' on AIM.
By @xenaagain · Nostalgia
We were talking about old technology and I mentioned spending all night on AIM. they said, 'Oh, you were so popular!' I didn't have the heart to tell them my buddy list was 10 people and I spent most of my time just re-reading my own away messages.
The full story
My parents and I were cleaning out some old boxes and found a bunch of old electronics. It got us on the topic of growing up, and I was talking about how central AOL Instant Messenger was to my entire social life as a pre-teen in the early 2000s. I said something like, 'I'd run home from school to get on the computer and I'd be on AIM until you guys made me go to bed.' My mom got this big smile on her face and said she remembers hearing me typing all the time and was just so happy I had so many friends to talk to. She thinks I was some super popular kid holding court in a dozen chat windows every night. The reality is I had maybe 10 people on my buddy list and half of them were cousins. Most of the time I was just meticulously crafting my away message with Dashboard Confessional lyrics, changing my font colors, and re-reading old conversations. I didn't correct her. It felt weirdly too late to explain the specific loneliness of the early internet.
How people voted
- Facts — 34% (84 votes)
- Depends — 36% (89 votes)
- No Way — 30% (74 votes)
Readers are split: “Depends” leads with 36% — 247 votes and 5 comments so far.
What people are saying
@karayy — Why do you think it would change anything if you told them now?
@mel — The specific loneliness of the early internet. a poet.
@milomm — If you had time to be lonely you had time to be outside.
@codywelp — lol
@brynnkindof — Soft.
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