Recently while perusing the internet, which I sometimes do, I came upon a shocking story about a woman who has been imprisoned for killing someone.  The part that was shocking was that the person whom she killed was not a real person.  Rather he was a virtual person.  Allow me to expound.  The story read that a man and a woman met in an online game and subsequently got married within the confines of the game.  Unfortunately their “happily ever after” abruptly ended in a virtual divorce that he wanted, but she did not. 

I wonder if they had virtual kids who would get virtual custody?  And what about any virtual property they purchased together in the game…who would get that?  Weird.

Anywho, the real life woman was none too pleased by the abrupt virtual dissolution of their virtual marriage and plotted virtual revenge unbeknownst to the real life person behind her virtual ex-husband’s character.  Confused yet?  And so the story went that using info from the man’s real life, real life woman hacked into real life guy’s game and virtually murdered…er…real life deleted his virtual character, much to real life guy’s dismay.  All those countless hours of online gaming wiped out in an instant…the murder weapon of choice?  1s and 0s in the form of a delete button.  This did not sit well with the real life guy, who went into deep mourning over the loss of his beloved character and so did what any normal person would do when someone is murdered.  He called the police, who summarily began an investigation and subsequently arrested the real life culprit of this virtual murder and charged her not with murder (I suspect that real life guy was not pleased with this) but with hacking: a charge punishable by prison and a hefty fine.  Do you think she could pay in virtual money and serve virtual jail time?

If all of this sounds completely absurd to you, and you’re sitting there thinking “Is somebody kidding me?”  Don’t feel badly, I thought the same thing and unfortunately; No, I am not kidding you.  The story did more than prompt some very confusing thoughts in me though.  It also made me really closely examine my own relationship with the world wide web.  Could I ever get so caught up in a virtual anything that it might realistically impact my real life in such a profound way?  The answer a shocking yes.  But my journey into the virtual world began and ended in social applications like MySpace and Facebook and not in a game which might seem a little more normal…maybe, maybe not.  It all started innocuously enough, on a visit to my husband’s hometown of Pensacola, when a friend of ours introduced us to MySpace.  It seemed to be an  interesting and kind of a cool way to keep in touch with people we knew, though email and phone had not seemed to have been failing us before…but what the hay?  Right?  Why not?  So when we got home, hubby created a myspace, and I soon followed suit.  Nothing unusual happened until I took and posted a new profile picture.  See, I didn’t have any good pictures of myself, so I spent one morning with my brand new digital camera snapping shot after shot, until I came up with one that I liked.  And it was a darn good picture if I do say so myself.  Within the day after I posted my new pic, I received a message from Joe.  I didn’t know Joe and was surprised by his message that let me know how beautiful he thought I was.  Really?  I was flattered in a way I had not been, in a super long time.  My marriage had been rocky for a while and had just suffered a severe blow due to my husband’s addictions.  The attention from this virtual stranger made me feel a lot of things.  I very soon discovered blogging and found myself virtually surrounded by people who “apprecitated” me.  Not to mention that almost daily, I would get friend requests from strangers who all thought and had no problem telling me, they thought I was pretty.   All of the attention from the men on this social application prompted some feelings in my husband as well and he began to pay attention in a way he had not in a long time.  But the more attention he payed, the angrier I became that it had to take virtual strangers paying attention to me, for him to notice my very real existence.  I tumbled.  No, not tumbled…I plummeted.  From the outside my marriage seemed fine.  The facade was a learned perfection that one can only master after years of practice.  On the inside I was in turmoil.  I began ”talking” to some of these men and the feelings seemed all too real.  How could I feel attracted to someone I’d never met?  In retrospect, it never really made me feel good.  It was a poor substitution for what I was really looking for…a better marriage.  As time passed, I found myself more and more glued the computer to the point where those people, the virtual ones with their sometimes dancing icons, under profile names like: Young at Heart, Douggie’s Amusement Parlor, Konichiwa, Bitches and Zot, and their usually agreeable blog comments, became as important to me as the people who could walk in and out of my room… perhaps at some points, even more important than them.  My life started revolving around that virtual world.  I found comfort there, solace and a neverending supply of virtual people who would give me affirmation and validation without trepidation.

My marriage kept unraveling at an alarming speed through his unwillingness to address our issues and my unwillingness to quit hiding in the virtual world I had created.  We separated in January and decided to make an effort to salvage our marriage in February.  Our reunion seemed perfect.  I climbed out of my virtual world and dove into my real life.  But my foray into life was short lived as signs in my marriage started pointing to our same old patterns.  I started feeling like a fish out of water gasping for air.   I’ve never been addicted to anything before in my life.  In retrospect, I’m pretty sure I was addicted to the internet.  More specifically, the interactions I found there.  My inundation back into my virtual world was moderately slow as I kept fighting to save my marriage.  What I found out is that you can’t serve two masters.  You can’t run towards your marriage and away from it at the same time.  The chasm between us grew and the hopelessness compounded.  I asked for a divorce and he left. 

We severed our online ties and he began to have an online relationship similar to ones I’d had in the past turning the place I’d turned to for comfort into a place where everytime I logged on, I was injurred.  I deleted my accounts and have since been spending all of my time on Earth.  It was on one hand me pulling the plank out of my eye.  I couldn’t very well ask my husband to address his addictions while I wallowed in my own.  And on the other, self preservation. 

I miss my friends from that world.  I miss the daily interactions.  I never thought that people I’d never met could be so important to me.  I left without saying goodbye and probably hurt some feelings.  To them I apologize for my abrupt departure and hope they can understand.

To my children I beg forgiveness.  I didn’t realize how much I’d been missing them until I started focusing on them again.  I can only imagine how much they’d been missing me. 

My marriage is still broken.  I’m not sure it can be fixed…rather I’m sure it can, but it would take great effort on both of our parts.  It would take us both doing whatever it takes: a tall order as we all well know.  The virtual world did not kill my marriage.  It was already injurred when I decided to dwell there.  What it did was allow me to let it lie bleeding and numbed me from the pain of it.  I can’t take it back.  Any of it.  I can only look forward and pray.  To my husband…I don’t know what to say.  I’m sorry seems trite.  The injury we’ve caused each other seems unimagineable to me.  And yet there it is.  I pray one day, regardless of whether we repair our marriage that he will forgive me.