A Death on The Internet
In the last few weeks I began to check the Random section of the Bearblog discovery feed. Surprisingly, the density of quality post is higher than I thought. Among, let's say, 10 post, I can usuall find two or three good ones. And the rest aren't that bad either (if the blog post itself is dull, I usually go to the "about" section of that blog, getting to know that stranger is always exciting to me).
One blog, written in Chinese (so a hidden gem! in a sense), caught my attention. All entries started with "Hi, Miss Zhen" and continue in the form a letter to this mysterious woman. The whole blog only has ten or so letters. I read all of them in one go. It turns out they are all letters addressed to his secret mistress! (I didn't get this at first, because he used funny names to refer to things, like "teammate" for wife... thought that one was funny)
In the first entry, he explains that his lover and he need to go "low frequency" for a while. And hence the blog. So he can have a semi public place to say what he needs to say without actually sending them to his lover (which is alwasy risky)
They were so good! I don't want to post the link here but if you happen to find it you will see what I am talking about. All the discussion of love, existence, and true self hit home so hard that I wonder if he just made up the whole affair in order to have pretext to talk about those things. After reading the whole blog I was craving for more.
So in to my RSS it goes.
Then I checked the publication date. Oh, no. Perhaps that's a bad thing about the Random discovery of BearBlog, that it actually is random and can give you some post from years ago and you thought it was written last week. The latest letter on that blog was published more than a year ago. All the letters are published in quick succession within two months. Then it just stopped. Silence.
I guess that blog has died. In the same way when I listened to Ezio Bosso's composition, thought it so good, and went on to google and him and found out he died only recently from some neurodegenerate disease. It wasn't exactly depressing, because, really, I don't know these people. I only know their work. It is through their work that I get to see through a lens (voyouristic or not) to their life. To a piece of their life.
It was rather, some kind of nostalgia. A nostalgia that does not belong to me (anemoia, the word for it). Denial that no more is to come.
This blog hurts so bad because it was so honest, and open. I got to see such a true side of whoever the poster is (whether or not he is lying does not matter, but I would like to believe he is writing non fiction). So vulnerable.
Then there was silence. Were they caught? Is that why the blog stopped? The last entry showed no sign of wanting to stop writing. In fact, it even talks about making this blog a weekly tradition. But that did not happen, of course.
The more I stare at it. The last publication date, some date in 2025. The empty space between now and then. The more the silence stretches.
So heartbreaking.