Reflections upon the demise of Rackne

[Lorna]

My cats divorced me.

I couldn’t blame them really.

They cited my internet addiction and absurdly overstuffed work schedule as grounds for the divorce. I didn’t contest it. I was on MSN at the time.

They took the house, the cars, the savings and the goldfish. I moved into a cramped and crusty bedsit..no..I just retreated to my room never to emerge again..I remember now.

I had the clothes I was dressed in, my credit cards and my computer. I drew the small grubby curtains across the small grubby window in my small grubby abode, plugged in my modem and happily began my new online life without any of the annoying real life distractions that had plagued me when I was a cat owner. For I was a girl on a mission. I had project deadlines to meet.

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My name used to be Rackne... and I am a forum addict.

They took over my life. Essays and projects were shoved rudely to one side. I was a virtual nosey neighbour. Often not posting. But always there. Always reading people's words. Emotive, vital words. Too scared of missing something to leave for a few hours to work.

I couldn’t give it up.

In desperation I smashed my computer up. It didn’t work. Within a couple of hours I had managed to leave my pit for the first time in months and I was sitting in the university library on the free internet access computers. It was hopeless. Especially as the projects I needed to do relied completely on my having a computer to do the work on. The computer I just smashed up.... d'oh!

I rebuilt the computer using blutack and elastic bands. As I did it I realised I would have to take out the source of my addiction. The ‘ppl’ who were responsible for my addiction. The ruiners who welcomed me into their world with smilies. The offer of companionship. The pushers. I made a list of personas that I had to kill so that myself and other addicts like me could be saved. I racked my brain thinking of how I could murder them all and not be put in jail for my crimes.

But then, the solution dawned. Not digital murder. Digital suicide. Rackne. That chain shackling me to the F5 button. The greedy virtual alter ego that was sucking me dry. Claiming all my thoughts for her own. Eating my soul.

One Friday evening, on impulse, I logged out of all the forums. I deleted her cookies. I changed her passwords so she couldn't creep back. I heard her screaming as she was squashed out of existence. Heard her pleas for salvation.. "Just one forum. Let me live on one forum. You don't have to visit me. Just let me staaay". Heartlessly, I flipped the final switch. The lights went off. No one home.

There's now a little lost girl out there somewhere in the cold. Standing on tiptoe, peering through the frost covered windows of a forum, staring longingly at the warm glow of the lights and people inside. Sometimes she taps on my screen and just for a second I consider letting her back in. But no.

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Alone I could work.

The distinction between day and night blurred into one seamless loop of coding, reading, textbook eating and f5 refreshing. I ate at the screen, my right hand on the mouse, index finger tirelessly pointing and clicking while the other hand lazily slopped whatever androgenous meal I had nuked carelessly into my mouth and down the front of my naked chest. I slept when my eyes couldn’t focus on the screen anymore. Often I would be woken by the bing of an MSN contact, an impression of the keyboard left branded across my face.

Always coding. Creeping with every line towards the moment of satisfaction when words and numbers spill across the screen in the pattern that had been my only goal. The only thought in my head.

See, in theory it always works. Except it doesn't work. Yet the debugger would tell me it should work. Except it doesn't work. And I would hit compile, over and over. Hoping it would work. Hoping that the one line i moved to one line above where the line was before would magically make it right and I could stop. Stop coding. Please, let me stop coding! Compile compile compile. Hours turn to days, days to weeks, weeks to months. Time loses all relevance, there is only C...

See C. See C run. Run C run!

Is how it should be. But no.

See C. See C taunting you. See C compile filling you with false hope. Run C! Run C run..run..it's

running!!! RUN!!!!! PLEASE KEEP RUNNING!!!!

Then it spits at you.

Segmentation Fault. Core Dumped.

And the unix terminal cackles with witchy glee and I weep. Alone and forlorn. Mopping up my tears with pages torn from a C text book.

There was only coding or asleep and even my dreams began to take on an eerie pixelated quality.

And still, the projects were there. The deadlines creeping closer. Calling to me. Laughing. Mocking. And still the code doesn't work.

Then one day I realised what I had lost....

Reality.

The shock of the real intruding into my virtual life was like an putting a wet finger into a live plug socket, my body convulsed and jerked like a stubborn salmon rejecting being stuffed into a tin in favour of slapping the salmon factory tin filler person's face with fishy goo, as for the first time in months I realised the full horror of what I had done.

I had lost everything that meant anything and was simply sat mindlessly tapping away at a keyboard for another addiction. High marks. I'd abandoned nearly everyone.

I cried for two weeks. But kept coding. Always coding.

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I'm still coding. But I don't want to do it alone.

The worst is over, the deadlines nearly past. Only a fragment of the work that once was is left to be done and although I can't stop for more than a moment at a time it will pass. Now there's space for thought about what comes next.

The real world and the people in it naturally would like a bit of time. But what else?

The ruiners. The pushers. No. You were never that. You were the friends. The sparring partners. The mentors. Dare I say it, the dreams. I have things to say to most of you. Even in my self imposed exile I was here. Just checking in. Watching. Smiling when you were funny. Growling when you were wrong. Nodding in approval when you showed your accomplishments to the world. I kinda missed you guys. Only because of a general addiction to forums though you understand. Not because I actually like you people.

I can't be Rackne any more. I can only be me and any words I place here in future will be different. The gloves are off. No hiding any more. Just me.

Expect bad attempts at something vaguely resembling writing, plenty of female mood swings, rants when I get mad, a liberal helping of my madness and weird views on the world and the odd request for a virtual hug. Rackne kicked up a gear.

No apologies for bending time to fit my purposes. Writers are allowed to do that.

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Hi i'm new here! Would anyone like to buy a custom built laptop with highly decorative blutack adornments and a revolutionary elastic band framework? Very stylish. One of a kind. Easily reconstructed when it falls apart. Chewing gum included free of charge for those on the spot emergency repairs.

Also available: The ghost of an alter ego. Likes chocolate and stomp offs. Free to good home.

Open to offers.

[turbo dan]

Wonderful writing. I enjoyed it immensely.

I'm glad YOU are back too...

[Uncle Bob]

Welcome to the forums, Lorna. How pleasant to meet you. Here's hoping the cats find their way back from their virtual exile.

[Southern Man]

Welcome to the forum Lorna!!!

It will be nice to have another womans input here. Keep the boys all wound up, ya know.

I can't help but imposing an image of the little match girl on Rackne, I feel sorry in a way for her. Do you think she will sink into the cracks or will she become a Phoenix and rise above it all?

The story is great. You are indeed a word-smith. Maybe a calling for you.

Hope to see you around....

Paul

[Daniel ~]

You can't make a Lorna without breaking Rackne's!

[Lorna]

Git.

Damn. You edited. Meanie!

[Daniel ~]

....it would have been depraved indifference had I not corrected my horrid spelling! ":O}

[Darkest]

Damn well written, WB

[Lorna]

Originally posted by Uncle Bob
Welcome to the forums, Lorna. How pleasant to meet you. Here's hoping the cats find their way back from their virtual exile.

The cats are still here. They just run the house completely, look at me in disdain whenever I emerge from my room for food and suck money from my bank account to buy beer, tuna and catnip for the all night choir practices they hold for all the neighbourhood cats on our patio.

No different to before really except I've lost joint custody of the sofa and am now not allowed within a 10 foot radius of it. Use it or lose it so they tell me.

I anticipate a hostile takeover of my bedroom within the next week.

[Betty]

Originally posted by Lorna

Hi i'm new here! Would anyone like to buy a custom built laptop with highly decorative blutack adornments and a revolutionary elastic band framework? Very stylish. One of a kind. Easily reconstructed when it falls apart. Chewing gum included free of charge for those on the spot emergency repairs.

Also available: The ghost of an alter ego. Likes chocolate and stomp offs. Free to good home.

Open to offers.

Hi and welcome to our home

Please take note of our forum rules. Advertising of this nature is only permitted in our classifieds forums. Once you reach a post count of 125, you will be given access to these forums. Ocassionally Daniel~ makes exceptions to long standing members.
Hope you stick around long enough to make it into the classifieds, because that sounds like one helluva laptop you've got

Glad to see you on the forums Lorna

[Lorna]

Why hasn't anyone mentioned the folding team yet?

And why hasn't my post count gone up yet? This is my 4th post but it's stuck on 0.

[Betty]

Originally posted by Lorna
Why hasn't anyone mentioned the folding team yet?

And why hasn't my post count gone up yet? This is my 4th post but it's stuck on 0.

The folding team...our folding team pusher is currently unavailable...but, I'll take his place in a pinch..

Hey, Lorna, check out our Folding Section!

I'm sorry to inform you that there is no post count in Random Nonsense or Mooky's Just For Laughs as well as our UT Clan Topic.

Did I miss anything?

[Allan]

Hello Lorna, welcome to AOA Forums. I hope you will like this place, its filled with nice and helpful people. Feel free to use our couch if the cats keep you away from your own.

Beware of Robbie though, we call him "grabby" for a reason you know.. If he is in the couch, keep clear of it. Thats the advice noone gave me back in the day... :-D

You really should check out the folding section, its a great team that needs some additional help.

Again, welcome aboard AOA. I think you will like it just fine.

[piccoLEW]

hello from me as well

[Daniel ~]

Did anyone mention we have a hardware section...just in case your into computers and stuff!

[Lorna]

Stoppit you.

I'll have you know i'm writing an essay on processor architecture at this very moment and hating every second of it!

Why on earth would I subject myself to that sort of thing out of choice? Computers, pah. Who needs em.

[piccoLEW]

yes, im in agreement with Lorna. like my signature says
i had to modify it a bit to comply with forum rules... but just think of the F word when you see it.

[mookydooky]

I'm confused...must be the jetlag.

[Uncle Bob]

Originally posted by mookydooky
I'm confused...must be the jetlag.

Get some rest and call me in the morning! LOL Welcome back to eareth, Mook!