Today I read this old post on Lifehacker about how to find anyone on the web. It was one of their most popular posts of 2007 and I’m not sure how I missed it the first time around. Anyway, after using a few of the sites mentioned to search for myself, I naturally started looking for old friends, classmates, and ex-boyfriends.
It was scary how quickly I was able to find people, especially on ZabaSearch and Pipl. I found one ex who I’d assumed had just dropped off the grid a few years ago. In the matter of a few clicks I was looking at his MySpace page, and reading a few of his blog posts. Fascinated, I pulled up my chair and got immersed for a few minutes. He’s a good writer, always has been, and the little glimpses I got into his life now were tantalizing - in some ways, we’re still so much alike, and in others, completely different.
But after a few minutes I realized something…I was cyberstalking. This wasn’t just casual searching and browsing anymore. This was…well, stalking. Here I was reading blog posts and looking at photos, but without any intention to leave a comment and identify myself, or send an email to say “what’s up?” I started to feel kinda skeevy, so I quickly closed the tabs in Firefox that contained all this juicy, tempting information.
To be sure, I did not have any malicious intent. It was just curiosity about a person who, at one time, was a very significant part of my life. Honestly, I would leave a comment or send an email, if I thought he’d be receptive to it. But, unfortunately, our relationship a few years after breaking up got kind of rocky, and sadly I don’t think you could even call us friends anymore. So better to leave it alone, and out of respect, to forget his username on MySpace and Facebook and the other web sites I found where he has a presence.
Maybe it’s better just to treasure the good memories, golden and happy and suspended in my heart like a timeless scene in a snow globe.
