distances.

ive become bohemian.
i mean that in a ive wasted this entire week in the most unproductive ways. its been a matter of being awake, and making a coffeshop my second home. i just sit there and converse with some people for hours (hours meaning a good 8) about the absolute nothingness that we are currently doing. nothing is done, nothing changes. and the next day we do it all again. now this is entertaining the first few. but when you look back on your week and all you see is the same day repeated you start thinking that something should change.
but that is how my days are spent.
heres where the matter of distances work their way into this post. (i had a better segway into this but at some point while i was typing all of that out i went and lost it) curious developments of the modern era. first we had a whole courting ritual. love letters, some serenades and poems were written and exchanged. that might still happen today but the wording has changed for the worst as new generation continue to butcher languages by adding hip vernacular and subconsciouslly continue a rebellion against the bourgoise that was started long before them and which they arent aware of anymore. so the language suffers, and with it so does the quality of romance. the end result of this process is that after years of its inception, women are now being courted with short pickup lines or the ever inspiring, "your hot." the romans, greeks and even the great poets of yesteryears apparently wasted their breaths and ink by devising page after page commending women on their virtues and alluding to their attractiveness. all they had to say was your hot, wanna do it? and their goal would have been met. at least thats the way it seems now. a matter of being drunk, and an asshole seems to acquire more women than any other method. some gym time to develope muscles that will never be used other than for aesthetic appeal, then do a little posing act like an arrogant asshole, be sure to belittle all other men in the vicinity and youve got yourself a girl. wonderful. i love how as technology advances we seem to be losing our social capabilities as a race.
technology. the very same technology that kills our ability to communicate is the one thats fostering it the most. behold aim, msn, icq. the wonders of instant communication. take your basic penpal and this would be the electronic equivalent (besides the art of letter writing has long since been dead and given a proper funeral) except the writing is about as eloquent as a 4th graders ode to his favorite toy. here we find people conversing in the worst bastardization of english ever given popularity. not content with street slang, ghetto speak (dawg. crib. ebonics if you will) we now take up aim-speak and to a lesser extent leet-speak. a convenient method of covering the fact that most people can no longer spell accurately as a result of spellcheckers being enabled on computers across the nation. so our spelling, grammer, and vocabulary is slowly collapsing. bbl. ttyl. wtf. brb. lol. rotfl. afk. gg. these are the new words. and with these words we write to our friends. with this we somehoe attempt to communicate our individual personalities, yet we expect respect from these same individuals.
and technology also gives us the ability to find other people though. an electronic dating plaza. people of all walks of life converted into databases of people with categories such as favorite color, age, location, interests, and sex. glorious. heres the downside then. now you meet individuals online and the love letter is somewhat reborn. conversation take place, but not the purpose free conversations you might have with friends, but the awkward i think i like you and would like to shag and some point in the near future conversations. except here simply saying your hot places a stigma on you (to women i ask why the double standard?) as something of a pervert/desperate. so slightly more eloquent speech is used. a/s/l? wonderful question, really this question should be asked in order of importance, s/a/l?
sex: female. (yes! the opposite sex. good so far.)
age: 18. (legal! lets go for three)
location: texas. (crap thats far away... oh well, wanna cyber?)
this is perhaps the most common chat room conversation. but what about occasions where they meet through aim, or msn? thats the location of the slightly improved conversation, and what im getting at after all that ive said so far.
msn/aim contacts are slowly becoming perhaps as important as phone numbers. and the conversation is also different. a phone call can be awkward, with aim... its still seen as more casual. it isnt a person, its a random string of letters on your computer. whats the harm in typing a brief response. which gradually gets more involved. until, gasp, they might even be typing whole conversations with each other, using sentences! yet the beauty of this system, and the only reason i insist that it is a modern love letter in the proper hands, is that these conversations are a setup to a further purpose. distance is a major factor.
if a person is met, yet distance is an impedement to actual contact, then aim/msn is the medium. and if that becomes the medium, then the conversations being had are being had for a purpose. that purpose being that of maintaining attraction despite a lack of contact (absence makes the heart grow fonder or out of sight out of mind?), which is a complicated matter. however, care is also taken usually to avoid expressing that attraction outright (love you, can be misinterpreted as a simple version of goodbye, much like goodnight... or it can be taken seriously, and possibly very uncomfortable then). so that declaration is slowly worked to. it arrives much later. in the meantime its the innocent flirting that thrives (much like the content of love letters from days of lore, which eventually mature into the fullblown declarations of love, which in this case would be expressed during an actual meeting). however even here the comparison between classic writing on the topic and modern typings is pitiful. we have lost our ability to create comparable works.
the shortening of distance through technology has killed our sense of romance. eventually perhaps it will find a renaissance and flourish again, but for now, i believe it is withering away.
i dont know if this made as much sense as i would have it, but i refuse to edit the post.