The Day I Found Out my Online Friend Had Been Murdered.
This will be another hard blog to write.
I was just tending to my crock pot soup when the thought crossed my mind to maybe mturk a bit (amazon mechanical turk) just to make sure I have grocery money while I save all my SBD for a computer. This always makes me think of my friend. You see, we only knew each other because we were on mturkgrind.com a forum for mturk workers. We never talked outside of that group.
Most people probably wouldn't understand why his death impacted me so much but they also wouldn't have seen him reaching out to me when it was clear I was having emotional issues. They wouldn't have seen him talking me out of suicide on a night he randomly wrote me because he just had a feeling something might be wrong. We hadn't even spoken in awhile but he was right, things were very wrong. He offered an ear and we talked.
He also brightened the days of everyone on that forum with his humor, generosity, knowledge, and kindness. Sometimes I would come back to the forum after not having been there awhile and I would see he had tagged me asking if anyone had seen me and saying he missed me being around. He touched me deeply even though we only knew online on a mturk related forum.
Since I had long periods of absence from the forum I didn't know right away when he died. I am literally sobbing as I write this at this point. I had logged on to tell him about Steemit when I first started here because I knew he would have so much to offer this community and could make money here. I checked back for a response and though a little sad and surprised when I didn't get one I just assumed maybe he had moved on from turking.
The moment I found out what had happened.
Seriously, this is so hard to write.
Awhile later I stated using mturk a lot. I do whenever I get in a bind. Being disabled I needed the extra income. I decided to ask what ever happened to my friend and someone told he had passed and gave me a link to a thread. It was a thread from when he was on life support. Everyone was trying to chip in for the costs. He had been savagely beaten by a stranger at a bar. The guy followed him after they apparently had some little disagreement. My friend went to go to another bar and this guy followed him and beat him to death in the street. He eventually lost his fight in the hospital just a few days after the attack.
I found the murderer's mugshot and I could detect almost a slight grin. I wanted to spit at my screen. I wanted to punch this guy in the face. This beautiful, kind, man who followed teachings of Buddha and who enriched so many lives was now gone. Wiped from existence. He left behind a fiance that was madly in love with him. I offered her my condolences even though we had never spoken. We talked for a bit and she was clearly still devastated many months after his death. She said they were best friends. I cried for myself and I cried for her. I cried for the entire world that was robbed of this person. I cry now for the same reasons.
Everyone here knows how real an online friendship can be and how much a life can be touched by a human through a screen. I don't know why I am sharing this here. It is pretty personal but I have a reputation for posting incredibly raw stuff. I guess I selfishly need to write it. I sobbed for 2 days straight when I found out he'd been murdered and then I kind of stuffed it. I had trouble even logging onto the forum and would go read our conversations. I stuffed it down because I couldn't deal with the amount of anger I felt. Anger like I had never felt before, not even toward my own abusers. This guy was really fucking special and I am still angry that someone ended his life in such a horrible, painful way.
So, that's why I wrote it I guess. To let some of that anger out. I never felt right grieving as I didn't know him in real life and since I didn't know any of his friends I had nobody to share the grief with as I did when I lost my best friend. Also, I shared this to show how real online friendships are and how much of an impact we can make by simply talking to people and connecting with them even if only through a computer.
Sorry for your loss Laura, even though it means little coming from a complete stranger on the web.
Thank you for having the courage to share this raw content with the community. I probably won't be the first to say such things, and know keenly what death can do to the people around them.
Congratulations for having the balls to share this with the world. Death is a topic that should be spoken about openly and freely to everyone, I wrote my master's thesis on Visual Arts in it, and it is an incredibly fascinating topic!
Hey did you miss the entire end point of my post? That you CAN make a big impact even being a stranger on the internet? ;)
Thank you. It was really hard to share but I feel it is important to openly grieve. There is a stigma attached to it and I don't agree with it. I like to get that stuff out there and let people know they aren't alone. Death is brutal for the survivors and I ain't hiding that.
That sounds like a very interesting thesis. I have experienced a lot of death in a short amount of time and am now having to look death in the dace really long and hard.
When you can consider the words you use in any relationship or friendship online it is easy to see that strong bonds are easily formed as you can truly absorb the person's persona.
I often think of my online friends more than my meatspace friends, even though I'm connected more keenly to the people online. We get to form an in depth concept (almost a paragon) of the person through online interactions, and our idea of that person is formed by their best qualities, as a result, we generally don't tend to spend time bothering with complete tools or dicks online.
This means quick, flourishing relationships, and deep, important and resonating friendships.
The brain chemical pains are the worst kind of pains. Virtual pat on the shoulder sent, because virtual hugs are strange and uncomfortable.
It's a sad story laura, here's a friend who wants you the best
A big hug and my best wishes : )
I know it's not much but I hope you're feeling better.
Thank you. I am no longer crying it was just hard reliving it.
that's great Laura, you are a fighter and an admirable woman.
Have a nice day my friend
I'm so sorry!
Life is real, life is raw, no one gets out alive. But we can all make it better for ourselves in the meantime. Thank you once again for sharing yourself.