Reinvent yourself -- over and over again
DATING is a lot like arriving in your college dormitory room and discovering you have a roommate who should be a cellmate. Unless you’re one of the lucky ones who meet their match miraculously, the “setup” is an unnatural situation in which two unsuspecting, ill-suited people are thrown together and expected to mingle.
If online matchmaking sought to ease that pain, the mad, mad, mad Web world of Linden Lab takes it further ... into the realm of your imagination. Linden’s Second Life (www.secondlife.com) is a virtual online society allowing its members to invent themselves -- and then explore, build, socialize and partner. Without ever leaving the computer, players can live and work (for a price of $9.95 per month or $72 annually, if purchasing virtual goods and services), as well as interact with other paying customers from all over the free (real) world. Since opening to the public in 2003, this population of more than 3.7 million thriving aboard a digital planet is “imagined, created, and owned by its residents.”
Where have I been the last four years? Clearly, light years behind in another lifetime.
What’s not to tantalize? It’s the ultimate dream come true -- the place where the world you manipulate is at your fingertips, literally, as you choose your “avatar,” the persona you create and then alter whenever you grow weary of the skin you’re in. Choose from any number of physical characteristics, including body type and shape, flesh and hair color, clothing and shoes -- then change it whenever you need that little perk that accompanies a new identity. I can be anything from “Girl Next Door” to “Cybergoth” to the disturbingly cross-bred “Furry Female (or Male)” with the head of a cat. No more bad-hair days.
Why would anyone exert all the energy it takes to flirt with potential losers at the water cooler, only to meet for drinks and spend another wasted evening? In this world, I can sip martinis and dress to the nines -- no more clothes-closet anxiety or awkward cocktail-party conversation. Delete concern over that off-color lipstick. Stop in at Vanity Castle and land the look. Take a turn in the Agora Ballroom or flit on over to Chaser’s Skyclub or the Sexy Joint Club without fear of safety or sanity.
Guys can “teleport” to Badwolf Tavern without worries of a salad-dressing stain on your tie. Strangers approach and introduce themselves, dressed in sexy get-ups from 2HOTT at the Linden mall. Burn that midnight oil; you’ll have only a virtual hangover on Sunday morning.
And if the rigors of the weekend are too hard on your conscience, there’s a Christian Fellowship Meeting where you can come clean.
Who knows whether there are any real-world lessons here -- aside from the fact Second Lifers seem to have a lot of time on their hands -- but suffice to say the shroud of this virtual society inspires confidence.
Take, for instance, the “Free Gesture Making Class” taught by Jebediah Spatula at the New Moon Casino. It instructs users on the nuances of animation chat and custom gesturing -- you know, all those major moves you always wished you had. At last, I can moonwalk.
And if you just can’t face the clubbing or casino, even with your clever disguise that hides your lack of social skills, a walk in the park with your pet dragon may be the way for you to meet your panting paramour. People do, evidenced by the wedding announcement I just received:
Friday, Jan. 19, 2007 -- Luke and Lindsay’s Engagement Party: After finishing each other’s sentences, dancing the night away to the same music we both enjoy, and starting a business together, we have found a closeness for each other that can only be topped by getting hitched. Yes, we are jumping the broom. I may not have gotten the cliche proposal on one knee, but I am confident we will be happy.
I sense a bit of regret over the loss of that in-person proposal, a bittersweet tone in her virtual wish for happily-ever-after. Perhaps a second chance is just as fleeting as the first. After all, what will she have to type for her own vows -- “Till Third Life do us part”?