From: nance@cbnewsd.cb.att.com (nancy.l.colucci)
Subject: How'd You Get Here?? (Was:Lurkers)
Organization: AT&T
Date: Thu, 27 Aug 1992 15:10:25 GMT

In article <-bcnkf@lynx.unm.edu> blowfish@carina.unm.edu (rON.) writes:
>Speaking of, net.singles persons, how did >you< get involved around here?

Get your hankies ready ....  :-)

Back in the fall of 1988, I was involved in one of those sad relationships
where I was totally in "love" and the guy was hanging on until something
he liked better came along.  We didn't spend a whole lot of time together
but when we DID go out, I noticed his every move and nuance.  I though he
was the epitome of what a man should be.  And eeuch, he must have thought
I was a bore.  I tried SO HARD for his affection and attention.  Blah.

A friend put me onto a public access bulletin board so to pass some rather
lonely hours, I found the net and s.s.  I lurked until someone taught me how
to post.  I wish I had lurked a bit longer to get the "feel" of things
because I may have acted differently.

One guy posted a request for women to tell the guys here how they like men
to act on dates.  Hey, I though.  I know that!  I've been studying *my* man
for two years now, and I know EXACTLY what he does on dates that gets my
pistachios shelled.  Oh yes.  He *never* comes out of the bathroom until
the toilet stops flushing, totally cool.  He doesn't ram his tongue into
my mouth when he kisses me, what a man.  His favorite article of clothing
is a pair of acid-wash black denims.  Therefore, I love acid-wash black denims.
He had brought me a carnaton once and so on, ad nauseum.

I posted under the id of "puppy", and thus the PupGuide was born.  I listed
ten or so things that I supposedly like guys to do on dates, writing them in
the second person YOU.  Meanwhile I had given this guy the modem number of the
system I was on and told him about it hoping that he would see my post,
recognize how I had "immortalized" him, and love me for it.

But to the people on the net, the reaction was varied.  One person told me
that the guys would love it because lots of them had never heard specifics
from a woman and now had a modus operendi, or some kind of baseline.  Other
people thought it was the most stupid thing they had ever read.  And yet
others figured that I had molded my ideal out of some fantasy and wanted
some guy HERE in soc.singles to make himself that man just for me.  Only
two people sent me messages of understanding because they could see what I
was doing based on their own experiences.

Being a writer by profession, I liked the praise I got for the way I
worded some of the stuff and Version 2 was born.  Trouble is, I was running
out of material and the items got extremely lame.  The responses from the
net were at least 60% in favor of this net.desperate.female getting herself
a life.  I got plenty of nice email messages but these people didn't seem
inclined to post.  I remember sitting in my sysad's living room after a group
outing trying really hard not to cry while I read s.s.  But how could I have
expected anyone to understand when I didn't even know myself?

Then at about 5:00am one morning I logged in and saw Version 3, from MY
id (puppy) posted in s.s.  It was entitled "Reeboks Make My Nipples Hard."
I could feel the blood drain out of my hands, I'm not kidding.  I felt as
though someone had superimposed my head on the body of some woman performing
an illicit act and published it in Time.  I jumped up and yanked the plug
for the terminal out of the wall, coiled up the cords, stacked everything up
and threw it all in the trunk of my car.  I was going to return it to the
person I borrowed it from and never, EVER log in again.  I thought that if I
got the terminal out of my house it would all go away.

I did talk to a few friends who were net.vets and the advice I got was to
get back on, explain that I didn't post that item, and then just post
things of a nice normal nature and quietly fade away.  One woman said that
she had a similar thing happen to her in soc.women and she did exactly that.
She said that when you disappear from here, people tend to remember the
way you were RIGHT before you left.

So I did.  There were a number of other reasons I left and I didn't return
until about a year or so later from another id - I had ceased being puppy
when I transferred to another location.  Some people thought I had really
posted the article and then regretted it so I came back as someone else
to hide.  It will forever be my word against theirs.  We all have our
Chapaquiddik I guess.  :-)

It's been a long time since 1988 and a lot of good changes happened in my life.
I have not seen or read any of those articles in a long time, but I have
seen similar things posted by people and I get reminded of myself when I
was in a different, very sad way.  I'm glad I am who I am now.

-Nance
-- 
Nance Colucci  *^*^*^*^*^*    o__    *^*^*^*^*  |  Work that body!
att!ihlpk!colucci            _.>/               | Stay fit for life.
                            (_) \(_)