...is loneliness; regardless of faith or friends, wealth or woe. It is the saddest truth we all carry."

Damn you, online community that happens to not have anyone I know online this present moment. Of course, I'm not talking about you Massassi. Someone is always on here at least.

Bummer.

Wha? Are you bemoaning that somewhere there is an online community at which none of the members you know personally are online?

C'mon buddy. C'mon. I be your friend.

I have no idea what this thread is about so I'm going to hijack.

I've been thinking a great deal about MaDaVentor lately. A young person in my life is struggling with being an atheist in his household and around his friends, and I keep remembering when MaDa defended a much younger me against some of his friends in MSN, and how he was kind of a dick about religion otherwise :-D. I had never really had a religious person defend me, and it made a big impression on me (obviously.)

And I've been thinking about staying up late drinking with VegieMaster and Sarn and everyone on Stickam, and how sweet and nice he was, and how absolutely terrified it made me to realize that someone so cool could just be gone the next day. I miss him a lot and every time I log into digg and see him as one of my few followers I get a lot of tugging on my throat.

I think it's really bizarre that the deaths of people in an online community can continue to resonate with me daily long after they're gone, but people in my own family or mentors I've had in the past that have died haven't stuck around. Then again, I've never really had a close friend around my age die from something sudden, it's always old people or car accidents where they die after a few weeks of hanging on.

Even though this place is kind of a husk of its former self, I think part of the reason I still log in so regularly is some of the surprisingly important relationships I have with a few key members. I mean, it's not like I don't have an awesome group of people in real life that I love and care about, and help support me, but I just never believed I'd one day be thankful for internet friends for the same reasons.

Wow, that was actually touching. And I don't mean to sound so surprised by that, but I just wasn't expecting it when I clicked on this thread. This being Thanksgiving, I'll go ahead and say I'm thankful for friends in all their forms, and for the fact that their memory can still live on with people like you.

I've taken a pretty large disliking to Facebook's constant nagging to add people you might know and to leave messages for people you haven't spoken to for a while, because about once a fortnight Vegie still pops up in that corner and it tends to leave me feeling a little blue.

Here's to the blue glowies of Massassi!