|
The boy returned home with his heart happily beating. He was
tired, since he covered half of Budapest. He’s been
anticipating this moment for more than 6 months when his
savings will pay for his internet connection and the world
will open before him. The often heard, almost slogan came
into his mind: “The information superhighway will become the
most heavily traveled road of the next century.”
What he felt was not quite happiness, but an emotion far
more unique and noble played around his throat. He was proud
to have broken out of the gray circle of dusty commonality.
With the help of his computer he can even soar to places
that have never before appeared on his mind’s horizon.
Ten p.m. The adventure is about to begin. He typed in his
nick and passwords and in that instant it felt as though the
sparks of his soul had just landed on the stage of night. He
was ecstatic when he typed in the first address and the www
page actually crackled onto his monitor. “This is fantastic.
From now on I can be on the net as long as I want and never
be bored. There are millions of pages waiting to be
discovered!”
That is exactly how it was, at least for the first month or
two. Then he felt that he needed something else. The holes
he felt in his soul were not patched by the adventures. He
was about to lay aside the magic net when he discovered
something. Someone, from among those who were up to now, in
the background shadows for our hero simply said: chat.
The fabric that had meant the world had once again became
fully charged with excitement. It was true, he never
experienced this before. He could talk with people ‘live’,
who as himself, sat hunched over a plastic box filled with
microchips and typed their questions and answers into tiny
windows.
Time, once again, as a heartless thief had taken the fire
from his eyes….that is, until suddenly a small blue square
flashed. It was a girl who asked for help, and kindness
over-flown from her words. It did not take much for the
boy’s soul to comprehend perfect harmony. In this
impersonal, yet in some ways far more personal world, two
souls have touched.
The mirage of unlimited freedom had buckled his heart, into
which an unexpected thought moved in: LOVE. He felt love
toward someone he met only a few days before, and with whom
he was able to exchange merely a few words, even those over
a monitor.
Someone he’s never seen. The keyboard revealed virtually
nothing, yet the girl, that sweet butterfly, gave away part
of her unblemished soul with every stroke of a key to that
other heart who, with increasingly concentrated purpose
whispered between bit-per-second that word which for
humanity became overused, schematic, yet at the same time
still represents the paradise of dreams.
Why should we always organize through the cool etiquette of
reality? Why does the power appear silly that combined
beauty with beast, and the soul with the soulful? Could it
be that two people, two such individuals who perhaps never
would have met had they not been caught in the elements of
modern life, could it be that they are in love with each
other?
A mere few hours of in-depth conversation, but the human
emotion does not recognize the lifeless combination of time
and distance. Emotions refuse to allow themselves to be
pressed into the mold of the everyday routine, they don’t
give in to the flooding emptiness and forceful attack of
lifelessness. Treatherous waters for sure, never knowing who
and when will show their real face or when they will hide
behind a pleasant mask. But the girl was herself. The boy
felt, he knew that his net-shine can not be false, can’t be
fake. They met every night spending all possible time
together.
This feeling was not present elsewhere: the boy was
surrounded by his internet friends, and there was the Girl
but still, his soul was afraid. The echo of emptiness, the
cold buzz of evil always woke him from his sweetest dreams,
fragmenting peaceful moments. These two souls still found
each other. Found each other in the fabric of a world-wide
net and in such a fashion that would never have been
possible in the real world.
The same monitor that used to be seen as the surface for
boring characters of a text, at this moment came to
represent Life. Real Life. The few currents of electricity,
the micrometer’s worth of magic that was constructed by
thoughtful, expert hands and the hundreds of ilometers of
telephone cable, like some kind of a vein as a warm life
supplying vein in the body, tied to each other the boy and
the girl, on that stormy, and netted night.
Based on his own experiences written by Thomas L. |
|
