From: steven@cray.com (Steven Levine)
Subject: Soc.motss:  The Color Version
Organization: Cray Research, Inc.
Date: 5 Jan 93 18:21:37 CST

Greg Parkinson suggested the title for this report, or maybe he suggested
"Soc.motss:  The Colorized Version."  Either way it is a big improvement
over "Soc.motss Comes Alive," my original suggestion.  I was reluctant
to write this up at all, concerned that there would be little interest
in an account of my recent trip East and the motss-ers I met (the
potential for tedium is vast), but Greg said no, it is important to
flesh out the impressions we have of one another, for public benefit.
I remembered Greg's spirited account last June of his meeting with
Jake Coughlin and had to agree, in principle.

In outline:  I went to Mom and Dad's in New Jersey for the Xmas-New
Year's week and, though this was not the original intent of the trip,
I wound up having my own private motss-con.  Tim Pierce drove down
from Boston to meet me in NYC for an afternoon.  I joined Mara
and Marty one night for Indian food.  Polly Powledge organized a
luncheon in my hometown (Middletown NJ), which was attended by
various and delightful AT&T folk, Mara, and my own mother.  Those
of you who follow this newsgroup closely have already heard reference to
the dinner with Greg Parkinson, Mara & Marty, and Michael Siemon.  
Try to imagine the number of preparatory email messages that
made this possible, and you will know why I (and presumably many others)
are just a wee bit behind schedule at work.

Observation #1:  Usenet is more than a hobby.
Observation #2:  Posting to soc.motss is not whistling into the wind,
                 as it sometimes seems.
Observation #3:  People who read soc.motss are really cute.
Observation #4:  I should have publicly thanked and praised
                 the motss folks in San Francisco who made me feel so
                 welcome on *that* coast last September. 

Part 1:  A Date with Timmy
__________________________

Do you know what I'm discovering?  That Tim Pierce has a lot of
fans in soc.motss.  Eager, earnest Tim who fights our battles
here and elsewhere with an energy that leaves some of us
gaping in astonishment even when our perspective is, oh, just
a tad different than his.  Tim, particularly in the politics groups,
takes on a tough-guy persona that is nothing like his e-mail persona,
which, in my experience, is gentle and deferential.  This contradiction
resolves somewhat in the flesh.  There you see his e-mail demeanor,
friendly and fun and comforting, but you also see the occasional flashes
of passion that fuel and inspire many of his posts.  This is not
a complacent man, but who wants complacency in their friends?

Before I ever exchanged e-mail with Tim, I mentioned in a post
that I had a net.crush on him (which prompted Mara, publicly, to
muse over what a gross.crush would be like).  So I was predisposed
to like him.  But I don't think I was prepared for how much I would like
him, how sorry I would be when it was time to end our visit -- a mad
hug in a subway station, with my train waiting on one platform, his
on another.  Nor was I quite prepared for one particular aspect of
what I liked about Tim -- which makes a liar of me when I claim that
I do not have a "type."  I guess, sometimes, I do.

The meeting with Tim brings up the issue of expectations, a big
topic when netfolk meet for the first time.  Tim, for example,
said that he expected me to be -- get this -- shy.  This caused
me to burst into laughter, and to plead with him to come with
me to a party that night where some old friends of mine would
be just to tell them that he had some reason to believe that I
might be shy.  I am still thinking about that, enjoying the self-image.

But about expectations, this is my tentative conclusion:

Observation #5:  When you meet netfolk for real, they do not
                 so much belie your expections as surpass them.
                 They are not different than you expect,
                 but they are more than you expect.

I think of Steve Dyer's comment to me when we finally met, after copious
e-correspondence:  "You're just like your posts, only much faster." 
He was referring, presumably, to my speech.

Part 2:  Dinner with Mara and Marty
___________________________________

Was this a motss event?  No, it was just friends having dinner.
Never mind.

After all, I've met Mara before.  She listens as well in person
as on the Net.  She enjoys people.  She enjoys just being, apparently.
She and Marty make one of those "cute couples" you hear about
now and then.  I have no surprises or intriguing observations
to bring to soc. motss.

Observation #6:  You really can become friends with people through
                 correspondence alone.

Part 3:  LEAGUE/South Jersey Eats Pizza
_______________________________________

Polly Powledge does not post frequently, but her posts are
always, to my mind, notable.  So I take completely irrational
pride in noting that she posts from a site that is about
two miles from the house I grew up in.  The part of me that
still, somehow, believes that being gay isolates me 
still lives in that house in New Jersey, where I left it behind,
having no more use for it.  So I wanted to meet Polly for two
reasons:  because I admire her writing, and because I like the
symbolism of meeting her in my very own hometown.

Polly suggested that we open our planned lunch up to LEAGUE/South
Jersey (the AT&T lesbigay group), which I thought was a great idea.
She also posted a note to soc.motss, which had the unexpected effect
of uncovering the younger brother of a high school friend of mine,
who reads soc.motss from a site near Washington DC.  We have had
quite a correspondence since, and will be meeting in two weeks
when I am in Washington for the Inaugural.  So the Jersey
lunch not only brought forth lesbigay folks *in* my hometown,
but *from* my hometown as well.  It is a surprisingly satisfying
thing.

Observation #7:  Wow, it would have been cool to have had soc.motss
                 when I was actually *in* high school (20 years ago).

My mother came with me to the motss.lunch in New Jersey.  When
plans began to settle for the lunch, it crossed my mind that
she would enjoy it.  When I mentioned the lunch to her, she asked,
"Can I come?" (which she later altered to "Do you really want me
to come?")  Anyway, come she did, and, in retrospect, I suspect
this was a little awkward for the other folks there, partly because
it is an unusual situation and partly because she is not on the
Net -- though she followed the conversation pretty well, and asked
questions when she was completely lost.  She was extremely impressed with the
folks she met.

Mara took a train from New York to attend this lunch -- I feared she
would have a bit of Steven overkill, but she didn't seem to mind.
She even spent some time in my parents' house, where she was subjected
to childhood pictures.  An extremely polite woman, that Mara.

There were 5 LEAGUErs at the lunch, plus Mara, me and my mother.
We went to our table and I sat at the end, making some comment
about sitting in the "birthday boy" seat.  Someone said that it
could be my conceptual birthday, and my mother immediately pointed
out that she, of all people, would know the most about my conceptual
birthday (though I realize now that she couldn't possible know about
the soc.motss conceptual family).  What my mother and I knew but
probably did not make clear to the others is that December 29 is
pretty much the right date for such a celebration, as I was born at
the end of a September.

Observation #8:  We probably have too many private jokes.  Does
                 that make us a community?  A subculture?  Or
                 a bunch of obnoxious twits?

Polly's posts, to my eye, show a lot of personality.  Polly herself
shows even more (see Observation #5).  She is lively and perceptive
and funny and, basically, the sort of conversationalist you would
want at a dinner party.  She also has amazing cheekbones.

Evelyn Leeper, who posts sometimes to soc.motss, attended the lunch.
She may be more familiar, though, to readers of rec.arts.books.
Her prose is crisp and lively and always entertaining, and that
is exactly what she is like in person. 

Over lunch we talked about LEAGUE itself, its history and purpose
and some of its characters.  We talked about the Net.  We talked
about people in soc.motss just as if they were mutual friends.  The
meal went very, very quickly.  I wanted more time with each individual
there.  There is hope for South Jersey.

Observation #9:  If you make in impression in soc.motss, you risk
                 having groups of strangers talk about you as if
                 they know you intimately.  And you will never know
                 it, nor what they are saying.

Thank you, Polly et al., for helping to make my visit to my parents'
home so pleasant.

Part 4:  Cobra Woman and Company
________________________________

I returned to soc.motss after my Eastern sojourn to find the tail
end of a conversation about the New York City dinner with Greg
Parkinson, Michael Siemon, me, Mara Chibnik, and Marty (I don't think
his last name has been mentioned in this forum -- maybe there's a mystic
reason for this, though I can't imagine what it would be).  My
problem here is how do I make my account of the same evening entertaining?
I mean, I had dinner with some friends, that`s all.  They are none
of them celebrities such as you would hear about on Joan Rivers'
weekend cable show.  On the other hand, they are celebrities
in my personal pantheon, so perhaps they are in yours as well.

I was really, really nervous about meeting both Greg and Michael
for the first time.  I had never corresponded with Michael, all
I had to go on were his posts, masterpieces of erudition and
analysis that seemed too good to receive for free.  And Greg --
man of popular gifs and great posts -- how could I make the
good impression I so desperately wanted to make on these
gentleman? 

Observation #10:  Nervous about the impression you are making?
                  Brazen it out.  Assume people will like you.
                  Even if this doesn't work, you won't know it. 

You know, we didn't solve the problems of the world.  We didn't
discuss the finer points of arcane niches of knowledge.  We
didn't talk about any of the big hot-button motss.topics.
In other words, the dinner was not an extension of soc.motss
conversation -- as why should it have been?  We have soc.motss
for that.  The dinner was just dinner.

Of course that doesn't account for the things that soc.motss
cannot convey.  How cute Michael Siemon is, for one.  How
strangers wink at Greg Parkinson on a regular basis.  ("It's
because I'm a 'type'," he explains, dismissively.)  And soc.motss
is not as good at encouraging smiles and laughter and companionable
joviality as dinner.

Observation #11:  Just because we spend too much time at a terminal
                  does not mean we are classic, stereotypical nerds.

Then Greg Parkinson took me home.  (Ah, how many of us wish
we could say that?)  OK, we went to his apartment in quest
of Dave, who wound up meeting up with us for what Greg
called "cocktails" but what I call "drinks."  Greg has spoken
in this forum of how sexy Dave's accent is.  Greg does
not lie.  He just leaves out some other aspects of Dave that
are equally sexy, like his smile.

Back to Greg's, to his photo album of motss events.  I saw pictures
of lots of you.  I saw who has what piercings and who has what
tatoos.  I now know what Father Amelia looks like in her corporeal
manifestation.  I know what scents and emollients crowd
Greg's bathroom, though Greg claims that they do not all belong
to current inhabitants of the apartment.  I also know what a
goodbye hug from Greg feels like, which is as good a reason
as exists for making a point of meeting motssers in person.

Thanks again to all. 

--
Steven Levine
steven@cray.com








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