playingpossum

A Special Thing

playingpossum — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 01:36:51 +0000

I wrote my first email in 1996, when I was 14, to my English teacher, from the family email account. If I remember correctly, the email consisted of just one line about how I wasn’t sure how to use this email thing. I wasn’t a very eloquent child.

As a teenager living in Singapore in the mid-90s, I was lucky that my parents and, in particular, my older brother, had the foresight to recognize just how cool this whole internet thing really was, and let us get online. My brother and sister introduced me to TinyTIM, a MUSH (Multi-User Shared Hallucination) that my brother spent an inordinate amount of time on, always signaled by the satisfying bleep bloop melody of our dialup modem. I made my own character (named Constantine because I was a Hellblazer reader at the time) and my sister showed me how to use the text interface to create things and explore a universe purely imagined in my head. Sort of a textual precursor to the Sims for me, I spent time thinking about and writing vivid descriptions of what my online home looked like. At the same time, I was hanging out in chat rooms (much to the chagrin of my parents who had to deal with the phone bill) like Alamak Chat, IRC, and a site that had a chat room called “Think Cafe”. The conversations weren’t always mature or even remotely intelligent, but a whole new world opened in front of me. I remember thinking that it was pretty crazy that I was sitting in Singapore, on my balcony, sweating in the tropical heat, talking to people of all ages from elsewhere – mostly the United States. Sure, there were creepsters, and there were trolls, but teenagers adapt well and I knew where my limits were and when to leave. Rule of thumb: Do not engage with anyone who calls themselves HotStudddddddXXXX2484.

Somehow I stumbled upon gURL.com and other similar sites, which provided a plethora of teen girl-focused content about things I couldn’t really talk to my parents about like sexuality and body image. I’d always had strong female role models growing up (my sister included) and was proud to label myself a feminist. Seeing an online community of women writing frankly about womanhood made me feel less alone and more inspired in a traditional Asian environment. I kept clicking and following links, even when it took forever for pages to load because it was so cool to put animated gifs on your webpages. I got my first, personal email account with Hotmail. I had Geocities (RIP) and Angelfire accounts and taught myself basic HTML so I could, again, create my own Thing, and post stuff I wrote. My sister had really gotten into designing sites and she set me up on my first “online journal” right before I went to Norway. I kept at that for a while, and eventually, when I got lazy, I switched over to LiveJournal which made online journaling much easier. By my sophomore year in college, I was (Nerd Alert!) a regular reader of and poster on the LJ knitting community - It was there that I posted my first ever self-written knitting pattern (for a shrug – they were en vogue ten years ago) and was amazed by the responses I got from people I barely knew who tried out the pattern and shared the results. High speed internet in college let me download music (legally and um, otherwise. #Oops.) and I embraced listening to all kinds of music and sounds – bands I had never heard of, bands that I loved and then gave up on, music that got me through some rough patches. I still have some of those files on my iPod.

It’s an amazing thing when you spend some of your formative years in a place that doesn’t exist on a physical plane. The amount of access to information I had because of the internet allowed me to grow and mature at a pace that I felt I was ready for. I learnt skills like curating information for myself and respecting the (sometimes unwritten) rules of engagement in online communities. I’m still learning all the time from what people say and write and share, and most days I still feel like my dorky teenage self clumsily ambling towards elegance and maturity.

The internet we know now isn’t exactly the same internet I grew up with – things have become faster and more sophisticated (even animated gifs!) – but it’s still the kind of arena where people can learn, engage, and express themselves. Matt Cutts said, in the context of opposing SOPA/PIPA, “If you think the internet is something different, something special, then take a few minutes to protect it.” I do think the internet is something really special, something really different, and I’ve taken it for granted a lot in the past couple years. Protecting the “specialness” of the internet isn’t just about opposing SOPA/PIPA – It’s also about standing up for democratic values, free flowing information, and choices. It’s assuring to know that the internet does have its protectors, and together we’ve made an impact to tell the government that there’s more at stake here than “online piracy”.

I guess this long, personal, rambling post is a way to say it means a lot to me that the internet I grew up with was open and free, and I hope we can keep the heart of this very Special Thing. It would mean a lot to kids like me.

Geranium Kisser…

playingpossum — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 04:03:06 +0000

…Skin like silk and face like glass…

In a quiet spot on the High Line, on an absolutely beautiful New York day, M. asked me to marry him. And I said yes. And it was perfect.

Kiss me with your mouth open
For your love, better than wine
For your cologne is really fragrant
Call on me, call on me, call on me…

So Sentimental…

playingpossum — Sun, 07 Nov 2010 05:17:10 +0000

Not sentimental no
Romantic not disgusting yet

When you feel like a cog in a machine (M. says we are all cogs in a machine but I resist inside) what is there that you can do to feel free?

Think less but see it grow like a ride
Like a ride oh
Discuss discuss discuss
Discuss discouraged…

Maxwell and Evey

playingpossum — Sat, 29 May 2010 21:08:18 +0000

M. and I adopted two kittens last week through a rescue based here in San Francisco. Maxwell (aka Maxmax or Maximus) and Evey (aka Evey-chan) were born and found in a Costco warehouse in Modesto, and then brought to a foster home in Daly City. Having them around has been a riot – They pretty much do only three things: Play (they’re into hardcore wrestling, hide and seek, and pouncing on squeaky things), eat, and nap (on each other and on us).

I Was Young When I Left Home

playingpossum — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 02:25:47 +0000

click to play original

If I Told You Things I Did Before…

playingpossum — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 02:13:48 +0000

… told you how I used to be,
Would you go along with someone like me?

My first post from San Francisco. Caution: fairly laughably emo post, but for now, let me marinate in my melancholy.

M. and I are still unpacking and arranging and trying to turn this apartment into a cozy space – It’s been more than a month (with a short trip to Florida in between) but things are still in boxes, and I’m still trying to sort out what goes where. Getting adjusted hasn’t been the easiest task so far, and I still miss NYC, my family and friends, my familiar places and subway rides.

San Francisco is really pleasant. I love our apartment, with its bay windows, fireplaces, and little Victorian detailing. There’s even a lemon tree in the backyard (but, to M.’s chagrin, we have no parking) and our street smells deliciously of spring flowers in the evening. We live a half a block away from a park that’s always packed with people on beautiful days, which means often. Our neighborhood is known for good food and drink. It’s not that San Francisco is personality-less, but sometimes it inexplicably feels that way to me.

MAK comes to visit this week while M. is in NYC, and being able to spend time with her will be wonderful. I don’t consider myself to be one of those people who makes friends easily, so having one of my closest friends (and a very familiar roommate face) here for a while will be nourishing. Since moving here, I’ve felt a bit like a bland, blank-faced newcomer – which I guess is normal – but I can’t help but compare this feeling to how immediately New York became home when I first arrived, how I found myself, and how easily everything fell into place. Having MAK here will remind me that I’m more than what I think I am here.

The challenge is, I guess, trying to stop myself from asking what happened to the girl that was me at different snapshots in time.

If you knew my story word for word
Had all of my history
Would you go along with someone like me?

Pixie Cut

playingpossum — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 03:30:50 +0000

Thinking of two songs tonight, both by The Pixies.

Post-dinner and hot chocolate, I had a nice quiet little moment in a bookstore, browsing through art books and feeling inspired. There is a lot of world I want to see and feel and breathe, and it is all in front of me. I cherish the moments I spend alone thinking these things and feeling invincible.

Some Kind Of Night Into Your Darkness…

playingpossum — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 23:58:06 +0000

They were playing “Fade Into You” by Mazzy Star at the Apple Store. I remember teaching myself how to play this on the guitar when I was 14. I wish I had a tambourine back then.

Service Bell

playingpossum — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 09:09:10 +0000

I’ve put Service Bell, by Grizzly Bear and Feist, on repeat.

It makes me think of early fall, and a darkened street, with a corner lit up only by the yellowish light of a bookstore open late. Its facade is peeled away, like a Wes Anderson cut-away movie set or a wallpapered vintage dollhouse, and there are two people at different ends of the store, each looking through a book. And at the same beautiful moment, they both turn a page at the exact same time.

I keep a service bell by my bed for you
let the others do what they do
I will hold on
hold on
hold on

I keep a service bell by my bed for you

Kick Drum Heart/Kiss and Tell

playingpossum — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 13:26:22 +0000

For lovers and dreamers.

lyrics.

Famous New Yorkers Kiss and Tell, from the NYTimes.

All roads lead to Rome and wild children.