SPIDERWEBS:
I Am, Therefore I Chat
BY SHEILA FRANKLIN
FORWARD
"i am incredibly awed by the words...by the power of chat....and how it affects people...we turned a cold and horribly boring day for chatters into an escape...we made them forget about r/t...see why i am writing the book? *S*"
During the creation of this book, I found that I was asking myself who is going to read this? Am I doing this for therapy? Am I doing this to cover the fact that I am a chataholic and somehow need that justified?
When I first began I asked some of my chatfriends what they thought of the idea. I had never seen a book quite like this, and was not sure that I should be invading their lives. Even though I have never met most of them and they are just words to me printed on a page and vague images in my head, they are in fact real people at the other end of my monitor. Not one of them objected.
They wished me well, thrilled at the idea that they would be part of this and even told me to use their real chatnames. I have not complied with that request because I feel the need to protect their anonymity. They are indeed true and caring friends like this one,
"I sure hope it gets published...I think it would make fascinating reading...and they said on tv the other nite on the news that 50% of all US households now own a computer and it's growing like crazy. Pretty soon, it'll be everybody, just like phones and tv's."
I wish to apologize to the ones I could not previously tell that I was composing this work. At some point I felt that if too many of my chatfriends knew what I was up to, they would somehow slant the innocence of the book, just as if someone were "playing to a camera". I hope they know that I am attempting to write for all of us, so that no longer will we be represented as computer freaks or unconcerned parents or partners.
Were I to name all the friends that guided me in the conception of this book, the list would number in the hundreds. They will know who they are and I hope they smile when they recognize the parts that are about them. No one mentioned does not exist somewhere. Should someone stumble upon our chatroom/home after its publication, I beg pardon in advance at the intrusion.
If I have offended any of my roomies I am deeply sorry. I realize that there are those who may disagree with my interpretation of their words. It was not my intention to hurt anyone and hope they will find it in their own way to forgive me.
In some cases some of the chatters are composites that I did not know well but had only observed. This only occurred a couple of times when I felt the need to describe events that had taken place in multiple chatrooms with the same results, i.e. the chapter on the "war". These fictitious chatters will appear to some of my chatfriends as negative likenesses of themselves. I assure them now this is not the case. I would never intentionally hurt another at the expense of this book.
I wish then to thank my cyberfamily and friends and hope that they enjoy reading Spiderwebs as much as I had writing it. Each page is a tribute to them, their friendship, their kindness, their love. I wish to also thank my children, who understood my disappearances for hours at a time in the research and sometimes ceaseless scrawling. Their patience was almost a sacrifice as they often relinquished their mom time, their computer time, their social lives for mine. And for Ravi, without whom nothing is possible.
The net can be responsible for the very alteration of lives. Since I began this project over 3 years ago, I have changed the course of my own life. I have left that category known as breadwinner/homemaker to pursue the dreams I left behind so many years ago. Perhaps I might have done that anyway, but I believe that it is with the encouragement of these chatfriends that kept me going through the rough spots. Even now when I chat in the wee hours of a sleepless night and meet a new chatfriend that is lonely, I do my best to ease that pain for I have been there many times. Karma does in fact exist.
