Porphyrogene!

I’ve been living in Pittsburgh for about 1.5 years now.  3 days ago… we got the Internet.

That’s right folks - for 1.5 years I have been living without the internet in my place of residence.

Crazy? Deprived? Pitiful?
Yes. All of those things.

But ‘Weaned’, ‘Independent’, and ‘Saving Money’ also come to mind.

 You see…  I had the internet at my parents’ house till college… and then I had the internet for 4 years through college;  Any time the internet and I would be separated I would be jonesing within a half a day.  How would I know what was going on in the world? How would I communicate with friends and family? How was I going to know what the weather was like?

I know you feel my pain, don’t try to deny it.

However, after getting married and moving to P-burgh, Kyle and I tentatively decided (mainly out of sheer laziness) that we would NOT have the internet… or phone… or cable.  Our house would exist in a veritable timewarp (is anyone else hearing "let’s do the timewarp again" in their heads, or is it just me?). 

After a few months it became painfully obvious that lack of internet - though loss of Gilmore girls and a consistently charged phone didn’t help - was wearing on our relationship.  You would think that at some point we would come to the conclusion that it might be better for our well-being if we just invested in the nebulous beauty that is INTERNET, rather than trying to resist the riptide.  But resist we did - we resisted until we didn’t really think about it anymore… and then a couple of weeks ago,  Kyle came across an ad for Internet and phone service for about $70 cheaper than anywhere else offerred.   It was too much for him.  He ran the phone lines/installed the phone jacks himself and last night, I officially surfed for the first time in a long time.

What seriously bugs me is that I’m not that excited about this.  I mean, the internet and I had some good times - some GREAT times - way back: www.addictinggames.com, www.cuteoverload.com, www.craftzine.com, www.makezine.com… But, at the risk of causing emotional damage to our current relationship (the internet and mine), I’ve learned to live without it.   Last night I spent at least 3 hours browsing around, playing various games and catching up on some communication… but I have to tell you - I feel as though I faked most of it.  I was using it because it was there and it hadn’t been for a while and not because I needed it or really wanted it. 

This is not to say I didn’t have a great time discovering some new stuff - particularly the bloons game on www.addictinggames.com  - but, I could have lived without it. 

Maybe the real truth is that I feel somewhat selfish or wasteful for having it.  Obviously we can live without it and be just fine… obviously we don’t need to spend this $40 a month on it.  We could be doing something else with the money either self-serving (saving/paying off loans) or not (charity!).  But a year and a half ago I wouldn’t have had this attitude, I would have been grateful and happy, and tumbling head-over-heels for the 14 billionth time because my hunk of a husband can install phone line all by his onesy. 

Maybe the REAL truth is that I find the internet to be a poor substitute for Kyle while he works 12 hour days, 5 days a week and I’m left at home to my own devices for 3-4 hours every night.  

I would rather have my companion at home than the nebulous ghosty internet.

Hmm… Anybody ever read "The Mayfair Witches" by Anne McCaffrey?