Pittsburgh! Are you real?
It's weird how often I think of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It's a place I've never even been and I hate the thought of having to hear people say pop for soda.
Many readers might not remember (actually I have no idea the age of the average bearblog user... probably not gen-z's), but there was once a time and a place known as the 1990s. It was either 1996 or 1997 and I was fifteen, maybe sixteen years old. A friend from high school who's now a fucking pig cop corralled me into playing Dragonrealms with him. It was a popular MUD of the era (like a text-only massive multiplayer rpg like World of Warcraft but only text). I really liked his character name so I ended up stealing it and making it my AOL/AIM sn.
America Online had this whole fantasy free form rpg world at the time called Rhydin. I now had this dumb screenname I stole from my friend and I was bored. I started partaking and getting into it. Just like sauntering into random bars and making my character do stupid things to get noticed. The (( hi! )) out of character (OOC) style talk was hilarious at times. Of course the main thing that came out of this at the end was endless cybersex. It was the 90s and I was a horny teen!
My character dated all kinds of people. And their character operators were ummm... let's just say I interacted with many people much older than me. But there was one person, my own age, who really caught my attention. She was another teenage girl from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I didn't know much about Pittsburgh. Maybe I still don't. I've never been there! I have read Michael Chabon's novels though. ;)
So back to the story... I was a boy from Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. A fucking mess of a half-Jewish Catholic Puerto Rican living in an overwhelmingly Italian-American Catholic neighborhood. I was confused. And I was also a lot more conservative at the time.
This girl starts talking to me OOC (out of character) all of the time and asking what music I like. I say Mariah Carey and Wallflowers and she is disgusted. She introduces me to bands like Reel Big Fish and Less Than Jake and I am blown away. But okay... nothing exciting. She also likes bands like Aus Rotten, Anti-Flag, Blanks 77 and then other crust punk, street punk, oi, hardcore, etc. bands. This is a whole new world to me! Wtf is this shit?
Then she starts telling me about how I should throw out my TV and smash it to pieces. I'm like "wtf" is this girl talking about? She says corporations are evil and brainwashing and controlling us. I am this conservative-ish boy from Bensonhurst who never had such a thought in my life. It was mindblowing.
I talked to her for a few more years. We sometimes conversed on the phone. She helped me masturbate for the first time (I was very sheltered) and had some bisexual gothic boy instant message me to give me tips. It was mortifying but obviously opened me up even more.
We fell out of touch a couple of years into college. Years later I looked her up and reached out. We chatted a bit but she was now this much more stern, professional, and conservative no-nonsense kind of Democrat. It was a far cry from the girl I knew. It broke my heart.
But I will never forget her. And I will never forget Pittsburgh. Maybe I will visit someday. It looks beautiful in photos.
Have thoughts? I'd love to hear from you — drop me a line at brian@pinkbeam.xyz