Taking a break

Incidentally this is my 200th post on this blog. Incidentally, it is also almost 2 years after I started this blog (I am 9 days late). I should write something reflective about how my Second Life has changed over the course of the last two years. Maybe humorously highlight some things, successes as well as failures and embarrassments. I should make some insightful comments how the experience of living a Second Life and blogging about it made me richer and a more complete person. I also should add some swashbuckling and bravado, spiced with some innuendo - I'm a guy after all (which reminds me that my friend Marx Dudek made a great compliment by saying she would not be surprised if it turns out my RL player is female). Finally, I should make some bold comments about future endeavours and some prophecies about Second Life.

I won't do nothing of this. At least not in this post. Instead, I talk about the human behind Peter Stindberg.

I am leaving for a vacation on Saturday. This is the first vacation I have in 3 years, the first vacation after I seriously started to get involved in the SL community.

I dreaded the vacation. Some of you know about my challenges in RL - or First Life as I try to remind myself to say. Some of you know about the fragile and burdened state of my relationship, of my depressing situation at work, and of the challenges caused by the condition of a family member. The last vacation ended in a disaster, forcing us to abort it prematurely, coming home ill tempered, not relaxed, and not being able to recover the financial loss due to the cancelling. And even though this was 3 years ago. I could not help but thinking of it, thinking the "what... if" questions.

I dreaded the vacation. At home we can avoid each other when emotions or temper runs high. During the vacation we are forced to stick together all the time, with little room for personal time. Ah, personal time. One of the large, true luxuries. Personal time for you, only you alone. Nobody who wants anything. Nobody who thinks (or has) a right to your time, attention, feedback or work. Not to mention true privacy, and even greater luxury. Hearing the music you want to hear, dance to it and sing loud and false to it without anybody being around.

I dreaded the vacation. Not being able to talk to my friends in SL or GTalk. Not being able to use Plurk or keep up with blogs. No opportunity to conduct my business in SL. We all know SL time flows fast - being out of the loop for two weeks, who knows what might happen?

But my human is tired. Exhausted. Shattered. My human lives between a rock and a hard place. My human needs a break. And gradually, in tiny baby steps, I began to look forward to the vacation. Not thinking about my job for two weeks. Getting out of the neighbourhood-mobbing for two weeks. Fresh air, sun. Trying to have positive experiences with the family. There is potential for change, and at least I should try.

My business is taken care of - two trusted persons look after it. I have a digital lifeline that connects me to my digital existence if need arises. I can relax with the feeling to not be cut off. That knowledge alone is good.

I'll see you in two weeks!

P.S. Just found a draft post that was obsolete by now - so this is just post #199