Thursday, April 9, 2009

Both sides of the mirror~~ What really matters??

Recently, Nayeli has been undergoing a lot of renovations for a variety of reasons. I knew that there were going to be a lot of changes, but was not prepared for what that meant, being new to sl. A day later, my mailbox was filled with notifications of returned items sent back to my lost and found.

When I rezzed into world, many things had been changed, moved, buried, or well OK...dug up. (I DO tend to be a bit of a hazard at times) The problem with my reaction was that I was at a loss, I literally did not know what to feel. It was not anger or hurt, but I was definitely not happy at all. I had no coping mechanisms for change in a vitual world that was beyond my control. So I froze. I stopped feeling, disengaged from the situation and stepped away to gain some perspective.

Now that is fine to do in rl, because the non-verbal communication helps. But in sl, the only thing that other people are aware of is the silence, and silence can be deadly. The assumption? That I was upset, when in reality I did not know what to feel, so felt nothing. I noticed that many things were moved intact, which I know took a great deal of effort. I was grateful and appreciative of that. The closest I can describe my reaction would be that someone had been in my house and had rearranged my things. I was confused and disoriented, possibly dazed?

My point in telling this is that it is difficult to predict what our reaction will be to changes in a virtual world. The physical objects and people may be pixels but the feelings and emotions they engender are very, very real.

What I finally said in responding to the concerns of my dear friend was that it really did not matter. Even if these things were real, none of them mattered because they are objects, not people. People are all that matter, in this world, rl or sl…the rest is just window dressing.

So this morning I returned to gather a few things and looked around, conjuring a plan in my head to restructure the fairy and mermaid area. I hope that it will be better than ever! And…I hope, most of all, you visit and enjoy it…

4 comments:

  1. i love the mermaid area very much and i hope it returns better than ever. i spent my second day here and have the fondest memories of that wonderful place. butterfly

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  2. Hi Pipster, i am sorry if you felt strange about moving everything around. i tried to move the entire mermaid lagoon as a single piece, most of the returned items were things that were actually buried underground that we exposed when reforming the terrain. I think a few items got missed (i want to blame it on sl hiding small objects at a distance despite my draw distance settings but i am not certain).. either way we moved it as intact as possible so we could begin the work on reforming the terrain around the house.

    The long term intent is to have a larger area devoted for the elven/mermaid/faery space.

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  3. Dear slut, I realized how much care was taken...I did not post this to say that I was hurt or that it was the intention. My reaction was what surprised me, not your actions. It is more about being new to sl and not being prepared for my onslaught of feelings that I was writing about, not anything else. slut, your motives and that of Ma'am are never in question. I trust you without reservation.
    Never doubt that a moment!
    Pippa

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