Breakfast Bonjour

This morning feels a little different.

For the first time in a long while, I woke up without wondering what was happening in Second Life.

A few days ago I closed that chapter. Completely.

I don’t regret it.

Actually… I feel lighter. I am having my breakfast, coffee and 3 strawberries, and I am thinking of you, all my friends in SL. Please take these strawberries as kisses on your cheeks.

For months I had been trying to live several lives at once. Writing every day on Primfeed. Spending time with friends in Second Life. Building Opaline Light article by article. Living my own, very real, life with all its questions and unexpected turns. And somewhere between all that, trying to write an essay and a novel.

At some point you realize you cannot keep every plate spinning forever.

Something has to give. So I sacrificed a tail.

It happened to be Second Life.

And yet…

What an extraordinary place it was.

Someone once told me, “In Second Life we walk through people’s imagination.”

I have never forgotten that sentence because it is true.

Where else do photographers create breathtaking worlds from nothing but pixels and patience? Where else do complete strangers greet you with a heart, dance together for hours, or spend an evening listening to music with someone they may never meet?

I miss those gentle people already.

The DJs who unknowingly became the soundtrack of so many articles I wrote.

Thinkie, full of energy and kindness.
Odile. Nele. Neo. Pietor.
Fredy… yes, Fredy, Fredy, Fredy.
Tomcat and Karsti, whose simple greetings always carried warmth. They “dared saying hi” to the “White Ghost” and the white ghost says thank you guys!
Shazza, whose joy seemed contagious.
Karni, effortlessly beautiful.
Akiko, endlessly sweet.
Cherry, patiently teaching me French…
Le genoux. Le choux. Le bisoux… (these French words that end with oux)
A lesson I suspect I will never forget.

There are many more names.

Too many to fit inside one Bonjour.

Thank you.

Of course, every world has its shadows too. I don’t think they deserve much space here. Some people carry bitterness wherever they go. They belong to yesterday.

The others…

You belong to my memories.

You walked beside me through impossible landscapes that existed because someone imagined them into being.

That is rather beautiful.

Now a new chapter begins.

The website is open.
The coffee is warm.
There are stories waiting to be written.

And as I’m getting ready to go help at church this morning, with all these memories still floating around my head, there is only one thing left to say.

Bonjour.