Virtual Identity

Though I have been on Orkut and Facebook for ages , it had never struck me until now , to look for my cousins there - who in my mind are still those little ones with whom I used to play with and they would look upto me like a big sister. But for the rare occasion of meeting them once in about six months, we had not tried to keep in constant touch. For some strange reason today, I had an impulse to search for them on Facebook ( P.S : Hubby says I belong to the new generation as I use Facebook while he to the old , as he is still faithful to Orkut ! ) and found them, and ask me what I found .... their virtual identities !
These boys, who are considered the introverts of the family have more than 200 friends each,
put up their whole lives in pictures, having multiple threads of conversations in scraps - to tell you the truth, I have never seen them more alive than this ! That hit me into realising one is not what he seems to be, its hard to judge anyone even if he or she is one's own family; there is a always atleast one hidden face, an unknown quality, an unexpected trait ... and what other place to express your true self if not the Internet. In a way, it also scares me to think I have to logon to the Net to REALLY KNOW someone who has grown right in front of my eyes. This line of thought led me to an imaginary situation , where sometime in the future when my son turns out to be a an obstinate teenager, would come barging into my room yelling
" Mom ! you don't have to tell the whole world that your son doesn't listen to you !!"
I would give him a perplexed look and say - " But I haven't talked to anyone, including your dad since our fight this morning "
and he would say with exasperation - " But you are locked up in this room blogging away ... and all those following your blog are calling me to ask why I said such things, this is no way to get back at me mom ! "
:))
That's today's technology , that's the way families are adapting to it, that's the reality though it may seem 'virtual'.