Kissing sleeping beauties

"This is like a time capsule," he said.  He was talking about his alt.  The one that partnered with my alt three years ago.

We decided to wake up those alts and go dancing to celebrate our anniversary.  "Why didn't we think of this before?" he asked.

I took time earlier today to update Alt #9 and his alt.  Thankfully, the skins we had still looked good, and an overhaul of the shapes made them look very different and pretty updated.  However, I got my alt a new gown (very cheap) and new hair from Truth (not so cheap).  I updated his alt's shape and got him a freebie hair from KMadd and freebie eyes from Amacci.  There was no point spending money on alts we were gonna use a few hours a year.

I hadn't even seen his main alt or any of his alts since last August.  We usually communicated by disembodied IMs or by email.  And even then, very rarely.  He is in another SL relationship and we are both very busy, so there was hardly any time to chat or even to get together.

But today was special.

He picked a jazz club and I met him there after relogging.  I was nervous.  I was giddy.  It was a strange feeling.

Since we partnered and put our alts to sleep, we hadn't really been with each other as those alts.  In our main alts, we were just very good friends.  Suddenly, there we were -- virtual husband and wife.  Since that was the only SL partnership I've ever done, it felt very very strange.

When we walked into the club, the hostess welcomed us and called us "Mr and Mrs" and his last name.  That, too, was strange.  Neither of us wore a group tag that indicated we were partnered.  Neither of us had a display name.  We had different last names.  So she must have looked into one of our profiles to discover that we were partnered.

Then we had our first dance as husband and wife, three years late.

A few hours later, we were on Skype, still dancing at the club.  Then we had our ... ahem ... (very brief) honeymoon, also three years late, while still dancing at the club.

Then we chatted a bit more before finally saying goodnight and we put those alts back to sleep.

Till next year.  Sweet dreams.

Happy Valentine's Day

I think, this might be the one of the loneliest Valentine's Days in my life.

I've (finally) finished the first draft of the manuscript for "Love, Like Dim Sum."  I'm doing some preliminary editing and fleshing out of sections that are too sparse.  Then, next week, it will go to a professional editor.

Usually, I have a lot of things that are keeping me busy and distracted.  But not this time.  It's mostly the book.  And the problem is that I'm needing a lot of self-soothing specifically because of the book.  I've been going back to old chat logs as I do my research, and the memories flood back.  Ergo, the self-soothing.

I miss the old days, the more innocent days of SL.  Isn't that funny?  We reminisce about old days in SL, just like we reminisce about old days in real life.

Today, the eve of Valentine's Day, I miss everyone I have ever loved.  Today, I am acutely aware of how much I love each of them.  Today, I wish I could wrap my arms around them all and squeeze them tight.  Even the ones who know me only through my alts.  Even the ones who only briefly touched my life.  Today, I wish I could hug the world.