-alone-

Been awhile, brother. Came back with some sadness in my heart over one of our friends. I used this moment to go back and re-read this original post, more than just to come here and let you know you are remembered but also to look back at part of why you are remembered so fondly, so loved by those you left behind.

I can relate to the OP, in that I am somehow an 'old person magnet'. Doesn't matter the setting, they always find me, sit next to me and start conversation. It may be about anything, sometimes they just need to talk. Maybe, even when I don't know it, sometimes I just need to listen to someone.

SpeedLimit55 said:
"Son...just because you're lonely....doesn't mean you're alone. Love is the best friend anyone could ever ask for."
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This bit has struck a cord within me. I don't know if my belief is rooted in this quote from so long ago, but a similar mantra has become ingrained in my approach to the world. Nobody is ever alone, unless they choose to be. Even if you don't have the strength or courage to ask for help, just letting them in might be enough to make the difference.

I've always kept things within, and dodged confronting such things by offering to be there for others. I know there are people who are there for me, truly 'there' for me. And maybe someday I'll open up more and lean on them. I'm not ready yet. But I'm glad I've let people in before, it can make a lifetime of difference. Like letting this scrawny kid into my heart so long ago, and your impact ripples long after you are gone.
 
These were the stories that made me fall in love with this site way back when.
TheLoveBandit said:
Been awhile, brother. Came back with some sadness in my heart over one of our friends. I used this moment to go back and re-read this original post, more than just to come here and let you know you are remembered but also to look back at part of why you are remembered so fondly, so loved by those you left behind.

I can relate to the OP, in that I am somehow an 'old person magnet'. Doesn't matter the setting, they always find me, sit next to me and start conversation. It may be about anything, sometimes they just need to talk. Maybe, even when I don't know it, sometimes I just need to listen to someone.



This bit has struck a cord within me. I don't know if my belief is rooted in this quote from so long ago, but a similar mantra has become ingrained in my approach to the world. Nobody is ever alone, unless they choose to be. Even if you don't have the strength or courage to ask for help, just letting them in might be enough to make the difference.

I've always kept things within, and dodged confronting such things by offering to be there for others. I know there are people who are there for me, truly 'there' for me. And maybe someday I'll open up more and lean on them. I'm not ready yet. But I'm glad I've let people in before, it can make a lifetime of difference. Like letting this scrawny kid into my heart so long ago, and your impact ripples long after you are gone.
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Hey, TLB - good to see you poking around - hope all is well. Asking for help has never been easy for me but learning to accept that which is so freely given has done wonders in my life.
 
TheLoveBandit said:
Been awhile, brother. Came back with some sadness in my heart over one of our friends. I used this moment to go back and re-read this original post, more than just to come here and let you know you are remembered but also to look back at part of why you are remembered so fondly, so loved by those you left behind.
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lots of love to you, tlb. miss you so much. 💙
 
I am so grateful to have read this when Josh was still alive. It's a testament to the spectacular human he was that this post still kicks so many of us in the solar plexus over 2 decades later. ❤️ I've experienced 2 major deaths in the last 6 months, both my step dad and dad. I didn't realise that I needed to read this again until I read it.
 
TheLoveBandit said:
Fucker. Ya left us too soon, dammit. Hope you are enjoying the afterlife, laughing at all us poor souls struggling along knowing we'll be ok and just need to hang on.
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Are you referring to OP?

Reading those old posts make me nostalgic for the innocence of the old internet - the ways in which places like this were a way to connect with likeminded strangers across a vast and unknown world before returning to your mostly offline normal life surrounded by mostly offline people.
 
TheLoveBandit said:
Been awhile, brother. Came back with some sadness in my heart over one of our friends. I used this moment to go back and re-read this original post, more than just to come here and let you know you are remembered but also to look back at part of why you are remembered so fondly, so loved by those you left behind.

I can relate to the OP, in that I am somehow an 'old person magnet'. Doesn't matter the setting, they always find me, sit next to me and start conversation. It may be about anything, sometimes they just need to talk. Maybe, even when I don't know it, sometimes I just need to listen to someone.



This bit has struck a cord within me. I don't know if my belief is rooted in this quote from so long ago, but a similar mantra has become ingrained in my approach to the world. Nobody is ever alone, unless they choose to be. Even if you don't have the strength or courage to ask for help, just letting them in might be enough to make the difference.

I've always kept things within, and dodged confronting such things by offering to be there for others. I know there are people who are there for me, truly 'there' for me. And maybe someday I'll open up more and lean on them. I'm not ready yet. But I'm glad I've let people in before, it can make a lifetime of difference. Like letting this scrawny kid into my heart so long ago, and your impact ripples long after you are gone.
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Ahh, I saw this older comment from a couple of years back.

We were young once. Maybe we still are in some ways.

Makes me think of Fitzgerald - "So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past"
 
tryptakid said:
Are you referring to OP?
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Yes, to OP. My view of the dead is they are still all around us, we can talk to them anytime, anywhere. But putting it here is like knocking on his door to talk to him.

Reading those old posts make me nostalgic for the innocence of the old internet - the ways in which places like this were a way to connect with likeminded strangers across a vast and unknown world before returning to your mostly offline normal life surrounded by mostly offline people.
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Different times. Back then there'd be 30 of us meeting up for a rave and crashing at the hotel before/after. Tremendous bonding back then.
 
TheLoveBandit said:
Yes, to OP. My view of the dead is they are still all around us, we can talk to them anytime, anywhere. But putting it here is like knocking on his door to talk to him.



Different times. Back then there'd be 30 of us meeting up for a rave and crashing at the hotel before/after. Tremendous bonding back then.
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I never went to any BL meetups - I mostly lurked for a few years prior to making an account in 2005 and even then didn't contribute much to discussion. I was also a shroomery member at that time and was more active on the IRC server and message board. I went to a couple of meetups with folks I met through there, though I was also getting deeper into opioid addiction around the mid 00s. I got clean in 08 and that lead to taking a step away from forums like this for a few years. By the time I started coming back here I was working harm reduction and drug user health as a professional searching for discussion/experiences around people using opioids in the time of fentanyl. Kind of a full circle journey, though notable to see how things evolve/change over time and in different snapshots of time.
 
tryptakid said:
Are you referring to OP?

Reading those old posts make me nostalgic for the innocence of the old internet - the ways in which places like this were a way to connect with likeminded strangers across a vast and unknown world before returning to your mostly offline normal life surrounded by mostly offline people.
Click to expand...
It makes me kind of sad that my kids will never really know or understand what the early days of the Internet were like. But I suppose every generation has that or those "thing(s)".
 
JahBeeuS said:
It makes me kind of sad that my kids will never really know or understand what the early days of the Internet were like. But I suppose every generation has that or those "thing(s)".
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I started using IRC in 1994, AOL briefly in 1995, before getting a dialup connection at home in 1997. Had a geocities site and became a server op in like 1998 on the server for a channel I frequented. The room had started on irc.mtv.com and was part of a failed attempt by MTV to host a live chatroom that they broadcasted during TRL. Profanity and hilarity ensued and the feed was quickly abandoned. The server, however, remained for a year or so before becoming unmoderated and basically just a wasteland of script-kiddies fucking with people who signed in. The room I had been a part of #myplace was moved to xworld.org which IIRC was a star trek fan server - I became friends with the channel and server ops /admins and eventually got server op permissions which I thought was so 1337 ;).

A lot of us in the room were teens and young adults and we'd call each other using business conference call lines that some of us had access to via their parents' businesses. Met up with a few people who moved to my area during college (eastern MA). The net was so very different back then, and IMHO was a one of a kind moment in human history, possibly the most profound shift in how we behave as social beings as ever experienced. WIthin a generation most of the world has high speed internet access with an almost magical capacity to provide regular people with versatile tools.

Sometimes it makes me sad when I see how perfunctory it can seem for people to conjure any piece of recorded music ever generated, instantly - to pull up high fidelity mapping of their location - to communicate speechlessly across thousands of miles in milliseconds. The things we can do today were beyond many of our wildest dreams when we were young. I used to think it would be so cool to be able to rent a movie and watch it over the internet via my computer.
 
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