How Second Life is doing my head in

Waking up from a dream

2007-03-22T22:49:00.000-07:00

I haven't been Maria for some time now, and the last time I was, it was kinda boring in hindsight, even though she had a wild time (pfffft, as if hot sex can ever be boring). But the feeling afterwards was "what's the point?". It's just a bit too easy, it doesn't mean anything. Hmmmm... all it means is that I get deeper into SL as the "real" me, and find some of the things that I was looking for as Maria, I feel less and less need to be Maria. She is slowly fading like the memory of a dream upon waking. Deep in my mind there is still a connection to the feelings I had as Maria, so she lives on there. Maybe she also taught me a few things about myself. Am I sad to see her go? Not as sad as I thought I might be, because I have my own SL identity now to replace her. So any sadness I thought I was going to feel is really sadness at losing the whole SL experience. Now there's a thought not worth thinking about.

I logged on as her today, to give away her L$800 dress, but..... I couldn't give it up. So she's not entirely gone...

So is this the end of this story? Maybe. Who knows which way the future will go. It's been quite a ride, and it it continues to be so, just without Maria.

Wherefore art thou?

2007-03-13T06:50:00.000-07:00

I'm losing her. I'm spending more and more time in SL as my male alt. He's occupied with "busy time" - no time to fall in love. And like a yin yang symbol, as one side gets bigger, the other side gets smaller. Maybe it's for the best. A slow fade is better than an emotional slap in the face. But I still hate the slow fade. It's so wrong. It's cowardly and horrible to let things just fade into obscurity. I feel like I'm letting Maria die slowly. But what am I going to do? Have a big fight with her and storm out, slamming the door? That doesn't make any sense.

For it to be final, I have to kill her. Delete her account. But my God, I can't do that either. There's always that lingering hope that I can be her again and be loved.

She's living in her little dream world, like a princess living in a fairy tale. She has her beautiful dresses, and pretty hair, and she's waiting for her prince to come, but she doesn't know that no-one's even anywhere near her castle. She lives in hope. So I can't kill her.

I can't.

And besides, I think I may have a whole day to myself soon to be Maria. And my God, is she gonna fuck anything that moves.

lmao she cracks me up sometimes.... some princess!

Mr. Right or Mr. Right Now

2007-03-08T01:08:00.000-08:00

My SL life has been all swirled around between my last post and here, mainly as a result of changes in how often and when I can get into SL. Here’s an update on what has been happening.

Maria has had a brief but bright relationship which is now dissolved to all intents and purposes. The relationship was more one-sided than Maria wanted to admit, and the poor girl found it a bit confusing. Things just didn’t seem to add up when she thought about what had been said and what had been done. But once the emotional goodbyes had been said, she was happy that things were over. She knew where she stood in this guy’s life. He was much wiser than she was, and she was able to leave with her chin held high. She did feel a bit foolish, a little shallow, and I think she was just a bit too keen to be in love. Did she learn anything about herself? Well, she doesn’t really know if she wants to be in love, or just live out her sexual fantasies. If you ask me, I think it is the high of being in love that she wants now. Looking forward to meeting someone again. Relishing every moment together. Sex is great, everyone feels good afterwards, but then it all just seems a bit shallow once the glow wears off. Maria has a new sexual partner now, and she is faithful to him, but their relationship is still all about sex. A bit of flirting, a bit of romance, a bit of anticipation, but it all funnels towards sex. So what does Maria feel for this new guy? Well, he ain’t no puppy dog jumping up and down saying “What do I do now? What do I do now?”. He actually holds the leash (so to speak). And she likes that. Does she look forward to seeing him again? Check. Does she like being with him? Check. But only because she knows what is waiting for her. Can she drive him crazy? Oh yes. So where is she going here? Who knows. Deep down, she wishes she had a personality. She wants to be more than just her looks and a good lover. But she is a bit scared that she is empty inside. She is worried that someone might try to find her personality and find nothing once the sex is stripped away. She knows that guys want to be with her while she’s promising sex, but what about after that? And Maria is a realist too. Love takes time. Maybe time that she doesn’t have. Sex is instant gratification. But there is no emotional connection. Does Maria really want that connection? Only if it gives her that buzz of waiting to be together, that anticipation, always thinking about someone.

Poor Maria. She feels a bit strange. She wants to be a woman, but she feels like there is really a man inside her with a man’s shallow view of relationships. But is she happy? She looks forward to meeting her lover and hates it when she just misses him. She loves feeling sexy in her outfits. She still likes getting comments from the guys. And you know what I like about her? She is nice to everyone. So that means that, at the core of things, she is happy.

So what?

2007-02-28T04:22:00.000-08:00

There are all sorts of people in SL. Males, females, females who are really males, and males who are really females (I should imagine). And God knows how many minors - hmmmm, that's an icky thought that doesn't bear thinking about. And in this whole gender mish-mash, there are friendships and relationships being formed.

Is this wrong or right? Are these gender lies hurtful? Well, I would say that if you fall in love with a woman in SL, who might be a man in RL, then so what? If he remains a woman in SL - i.e. he doesn't drop a nasty surprise on you - then does it really matter? You have fallen in love with what that person has chosen to do and chosen to say in SL. What that person has done and said is real. The RL lover doesn't look like you think they look, their voice doesn't sound like you think it sounds, and they may not have the gender you think they have. But did you fall in love with the SL person or the RL person?

There is a big if here though: "if he remains a woman in SL". To lead someone to believe you are a woman and then to eventually tell them you are a man (or vice versa) is disgusting and evil.

There is an oh-so-subtle shift here. Previously, I only spoke about being infatuated with Maria. Now I am talking about the possibility of being in love with another SL person (be they male or female). But... is it being in love with a person, or in love with the idea of being in love? Hmmm... I suspect it's the latter.

And the old question remains: do I want Maria to be in love, do I want to be in love, or is it the same thing?

Dirty little tramp

2007-02-26T14:50:00.000-08:00

While talking with a beautiful soul... hello :) ... I realized some things. When I'm in SL as my male self, I just talk to girls and just.... talk. I don't even think about sex. But when I'm Maria, I just want to flirt, seduce and leave a guy gasping for more. So my masculine side is more feminine than my more masculine feminine side. lmao. But my friend wisely pointed out that as an SL guy, I probably would feel like I'm cheating on my wife, and that is true I think. Plus my SL male self looks too much like me in RL and it would just be too weird, too close to reality and not fantasy. If I want sex looking like me, I'll just have it in RL, thank you very much.

When I look in the mirror in RL, I just see some guy. I don't see a woman in a man's body, I don't look into my eyes and think what a weirdo. Being Maria is just a place in my head. When I look at Maria on the screen in SL, I become her, when I talk it's her talking, and the RL me disappears somewhere (probably goes off to watch sport on TV).

One thing I am noticing is that I want instant gratification. And when do I want it? Now! What better way than a quick fling? Everybody's happy, I make someone feel good and I get showered with praise and compliments. I could work on my SL relationship but it's turning into work, with all of the worries and stresses of an RL relationship. Maybe the rewards would be greater, but I'm conscious of my time. Not a moment to waste.

And anyway, there was this guy..... on a beach.....

....and when you've had black you can never go back ;)

Oh dear, I'm sliding down that apple tree again... sometimes the ripest apples are the ones that are on the ground.

Apples

2007-02-25T03:48:00.000-08:00

An RL friend sent me this:

Women are like apples on trees. The best ones are at the top of the tree. Most men don't want to reach for the good ones because they are afraid of falling and getting hurt. Instead, they sometimes take the apples from the ground that aren't as good, but easy. The apples at the top think something is wrong with them, when in reality, they're amazing. They just have to wait for the right man to come along, the one who is brave enough to climb all the way to the top of the tree.

What has this got to do with this tale? Maria needs to climb a bit higher up that tree herself. And if someone is brave enough to climb onto the first branch, she shouldn't knock them down, they might be capable of climbing much higher than first impressions might indicate.

But she still might give that tree a bit of a shake sometimes to see who falls out :)

A little cloud...

2007-02-22T18:26:00.000-08:00

Maria sits with her chin on her hand. She looks grumpy. She is thinking about her SL boyfriend.

Where's the spontaneity? Surprise me. Use your imagination. You've been sweet to me, but how about if you have an idea for a change. Why do I have to be the one to suggest everything? Make me feel special, like I'm the only one. Cos at the moment I just don't know. I don't even know if you're looking forward to seeing me again.

The relationship

2007-02-21T20:54:00.000-08:00

My lovely Maria is now in a "relationship" with a guy I guess (yes, "the" guy from The power struggle). Flirting, romance, intimacy, friggin' pornstar sex. Wow. Hang on, I'll say it again.... Wow. Mr HotShot is Mr Hot Butter to my knife. But there's still that edge of fear - I'll get to that later.

Part of me wants to blurt out "...and then I said this, and then he said that, and then we did this..." but I can't get into any kind of specifics for fear that he finds this blog (small chance I know, but...) and recognizes himself. For now my greatest fear is that he will find out what game is being played here and be disgusted. Or that I will make some huge mistake and give it all away. Here's an interesting question: if this ends in tears, who will I feel sorry for the most - me, Maria or him? I think the order is just that: me, Maria, him. Or maybe Maria, me, him. But he will get over it. If he has any kind of wisdom, he will relish the beautiful time he had because that time was real. And I know the pain is coming for me too, but for now I am going to touch the Sun anyway.

It's the male in me that thinks in specifics and details, but let's let Maria talk about her feelings (which maybe RL women can smile at and which are maybe a little more real to me now too):

Remember how I approached him and more or less asked to see him again? Well, here's the thing: before I spoke to him again I was scared, nervous and excited. I wrote the IM and took ages to gather the courage to click Send. What if he had heaps of other girls and didn't want to see me again? What if I bored him, or was too much for him? What if I was too pushy or too demanding or too forward? What if he was busy with other things and didn't want me to interrupt him?

I had looked around at some of the sex shops. My God there was so much stuff there for men and women... what did I know? I have nothing, just my experience and imagination. What if I was too much of a novice for him? He looks and talks like he's been around a bit, he has the equipment himself.... What if I thought I was really good but he was bored?

What should I wear, oh my God what to wear? I can't wear the same outfit every time I see him... so I trawled the freebie clothes, and threw something together. Ha ha, tried this top with those bottoms ad nauseam. It took an age but in the end it looked OK. That was my casual clothes sorted. I also need some "nicer" clothers, but I got that sorted too after more hours. My God it takes a long time to look nice. If you see a drop-dead gorgeous SL babe, it didn't take her 10 minutes to look like that, so you'd better appreciate it you schmucks.

Which leads me to another thing... when you SL guys meet your dates, you tell them they look gorgeous STRAIGHT AWAY. Not in 10 minutes, but STRAIGHT AWAY. So much effort goes into looking hot that you better say something ASAP or you'll be getting daggers thunk at you.

OK, Mr. JustSomeGuy here again. Sure, Maria was scared and nervous, but you know what? The guys are 10 times more scared and more nervous. Girls, if you just take the lead a little more and tell the guys what to do or what you want, they will be putty in your hands. I think the guys' fear is of boring the girl, or saying something really stupid which she finds dumb, or not knowing if she really wants to do what you're doing or is just *tolerating* you until something better comes along. Or maybe that's just me.... what do I know?

To all the SL girls looking for relationships in-world, how hard is it for you girls? Is it easy or hard? Is it harder to actually be able to find someone worthwhile striking up a relationship with, or is it harder to create and grow the relationship once you find that person?

If I want a real challenge - why don't I do all this as an SL guy? Because that's not how this all started, remember? And if I'm a girl, I'm not cheating on my RL wife...... am I?

And note to self - Female Realism 101: in game as Maria - talk more, bla bla bla bla and drive the guy nuts by changing your mind all the time and saying one thing and doing another.

P.S. and how was the date after all the worry?

OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG

... that's how.

Hang on, what if....

2007-02-18T21:38:00.000-08:00

I said before that I need SL men to compliment Maria because I can’t. We’re in separate dimensions and it’s like I can only watch her through a one-way window. Well, here’s a thought. I have a male SL character as well... what would happen if he met Maria in SL? What if he told her she was beautiful? Naaah, that would be completely daft. It would be like acting out the encounter holding a Barbie doll in one hand and a Ken doll in the other.
[assumes robotic monotone voice...]

“Hello...Maria...You...look...lovely”
“Thank...you”
“Do...you...want...to...dance?”

It just wouldn’t make any sense. Alright, you can stop laughing now. I know a lot of this doesn’t make much sense.

It’s got to be a human on the other end of the line, with all of the randomness and unpredictability that goes with that. What does that tell me? Well, it makes the relationship more real. So the big question remains - do I want the relationship for Maria so I can watch her become more of a woman, or do I want it for me? Hmmmm... I don't know the answer to that one... yet.

The power struggle

2007-02-15T19:26:00.000-08:00

Well, I suppose I should give my special little friend a name. For the purpose of this blog, I will call her “Maria”. It has nothing to do with her SL name, so don’t go looking for Maria.

By now, Maria has met a few guys, and has got a few guys on her friends list. Already there are some interesting dynamics going on, relating to the sexual tension of the encounter. One poor guy nearly wet his pants when Maria spoke to him, but then again, Maria was a dreadful flirt. Cute... he really went weak at the knees. But he was so kind of excited and nervous that she wasn’t really that interested. She’s actually kind by nature, so she’ll see him again, ‘cos she said she would. And she can’t ignore all those impassioned IMs now, can she?

But then there was this other guy. Maria and he were in quite a sexy place, not getting up to anything, and Maria was giving out just tiny flirts and hints, but the guy was totally cool. He didn’t drop his bundle. He looked and acted like he had it altogether. He did the same back to her, tiny hints of wickedness, but didn’t try anything. They parted, leaving Maria wanting more.

Dammit man, you are supposed to be in my power! You are supposed to beg me. Instead, it was the other way around. A new experience for my Maria.

OK... I buckled. I asked to meet him again in a more intimate way. I tried to make it sound genuine and not too keen, like a desperate woman might coyly ask (yet again, how I imagine she might coyly ask). I want to ask the girls, did I do right or wrong? I was scared Maria would never hear from him again. She should have been stronger maybe and held out a bit longer. Is that the rule, never ask the guy? Well, we’ll see where it goes from here.

There’s gotta to be a lesson for the SL guys here too. Contrast the tale of two guys above. Which one would you rather be? Ha ha, you probably want to know what a woman would think of the two guys, not what a man imagines a woman would think. I can only go so far.

A pause for reflection

2007-02-15T02:22:00.000-08:00

Phew. I think it's time to sit back and take stock of where I'm at. People may wonder "You shmuck. Why don't you just go into SL as a man and strike up a relationship with a girl?". Some people reading this, who have never experienced SL, might say "Why the hell are you talking about making relationships in a computer game? Get out into the real world!".

Well, for starters, I'm not really looking for a relationship. I'm a happily married man who has never cheated on his wife. My relationship with my wife is all that I need in that department. So I have no desire to form an RL extra-marital relationship with anyone. So why even contemplate an SL affair with a woman? Exactly, I'm not. Then why the hell am I infatuated with my SL girl?

I think it has something to do with creating her, and being her in-world. I look at her as another person, but at the same time I am her. I have imbued her with goals, as impure and selfish (for me) as they may be, and somehow I need to help her fulfil her goals. I want to expand her femininity. I want her to grow.

[sitting here with that blank inward stare]

Subconsciously, I must be crediting her with this entire personality which doesn't necessarily manifest itself in any way in SL. But it seems real to me somewhere inside my mind. It's like a perfect imaginary friend. But the technology of SL brings that friend just far enough into reality via appearance, movement and interaction with other people to make that imaginary friendship a powerful force.

I could still find this in another SL girl, as an SL guy, right? No, I would never find her. I would never find that perfect person. It's not possible for me to be disappointed with my girl, she looks just right, she acts just right. She is faultless because I have made her from a perfect mould. And our minds are already as intertwined as it is possible to be. You know how wives are, how any partner is, for that matter. You may love someone with your heart and soul, but the other person is never perfect.

There's another big aspect to this, I suspect. She is a guilty, forbidden pleasure. I have to go to a special place to find her, called Second Life. I have to sneak some time in SL here and there to be with her, and find some even more private time to cyber with her. When I finally get to that time, I am glad to see her again. If I was with her 24/7, I would get bored, when I realized how shallow she actually was. My god, I actually feel slightly guilty saying that about her, as if I have insulted her.

At the moment, I can find enough secret time. But I fear that the time is near when it will get harder for me to find the time to be with her. And that fills me with great sadness. Jesus, I'm starting to cry. What a f***ed up dude. I challenge you to listen to the grandeur of the Icelandic band Sigur Rós with a heavy heart and not cry.

I can't talk about this to anyone in RL. I can't talk about this to anyone in SL. I can only talk to the faceless therapist called Blogger.

I sit here and wonder what readers may think:
a) Geez, what a loser. Get a life. Get a grip.
b) Oh you poor guy.
c) Oh you lucky guy.

All I know is that there are many SL'ers out there how would understand how these feelings could come about.

It all comes together

2007-02-14T23:41:00.000-08:00

Well, there have been some interesting developments in my girl’s love life. For a start, she’s now “experienced”. Now, in RL, I’m not into “cybering” - what an odd term. I’ve never done it before, not in a chat room, not in anything. This experience was kinda fun. It looked quite real, and the guy was surprisingly “functional”, although the pose balls are pretty daft really when you just spring into position and then bounce out again. Now if there was a nice smooth transition into and out of the positions, it would look a whole lot more realistic. Or maybe I just haven’t found good pose balls yet.

Anyway, it was a tricky situation for me. The guy told me he was physically satisfied in RL (what a tacky discussion - I feel a little bit better not blurting it out in crude terms). I had to concentrate to say in chat what I knew the guy would want to hear (I’m a guy too, remember?), but make it sound like it was coming from a woman. Hell, the guy got his rocks off so it must have worked. And goddam it my girl is sexy. Did I want the guy to come? Heck no, I didn’t care. I thought it was kinda gross. But you know how I am with this girl. I thought “Goddam it girl, you are good. You are a sex goddess.”. She has a power.

So once again, the question has to be asked, what the hell is going on here? Was I turned on by this whole sordid affair? A bit, yes, but you know who my eyes were on. Did I want to form a relationship with this guy? Duh. I’m a guy so you know the answer to that one. If the guy wants to form a relationship with me it’s just so he can have more hot sex. Yet it is important to me that my girl is like a real woman. I guess in some pathetic way it makes her more real to me. Like I said in an earlier post, I guess it was just my crazy way of me having sex with my dream girl.

And now the inevitable ego thing. Was I brilliant or would the guy have enjoyed himself just as much with a furry? Did the fact that my girl knew exactly what to say to this guy make it better for him? How do I know that what I wanted to hear would be what the RL guy wanted to hear? What would a hot girl really have said? (yes, it’s true, I’ve never had RL sex with a wild fantasy nympho dream girl). If any RL girl readers have made it this far in my sleazy tale, are they wondering “hmmmm, what would I have said... and what did this guy say?”?

So many hypothetical questions. Please leave comments if you are at all inclined. I would love to talk about it.

Oh Jesus, I just had a thought... what if the SL guy was a RL girl? Surely not.

Sexier and sexier

2007-02-14T22:55:00.000-08:00

Well, at least I had enough money to upload one texture. Highest on my list of priorities was to improve my naked appearance. Why? Well, she would just look a whole lot sexier to me if she didn’t look like a mannequin when she was naked. She must surely look better to other SL guys as well, if I could get anyone interested enough (what is wrong with these guys?). I couldn’t get a whole skin, which is the best way to go I suppose, so I settled for a texture that I put onto some special underpants.... which didn’t look a whole lot like underpants. Seems to work. I just have to remember to wear them. If I’ve got knickers on, I just wear the other. If I take off the knickers first, then secondly wear the special underpants, it looks really daft. I really gotta get a skin. I don’t think I’d have the skills to make a skin myself, so it’s on the shopping list (if I can ever get enough money).

I also discovered some free animation overrides and other animations, so now my girl can do a whole lot of interesting things. Sexier and sexier. Did I tell you she is hot?

Money, money, money...

2007-02-14T21:46:00.000-08:00

... must be funny, in a rich man's world.

My girl looks great, but you know, she could do better. She’s got a pretty limited wardrobe due to this little problem: L$0. How is she going to get into black suspenders for me? And she needs a black choker with a diamond on it. [hang on..... just getting a glass of water to cool down] And she needs some anatomical work done too. Maybe a new skin, although her skin looks fine to me. It’s just missing some..... detail. OK, being a male, I am goal driven. Goal: look good for me. Task: Get some L$.

Off I wandered, trying to camp, scrounging around money trees, winning little competitions here and there until I amassed a small fortune: L$10. This was pathetic I thought. Skins and clothes I had seen in shops cost many hundreds of L$. I was never going to get there. I needed a new strategy.

Hmmmm... how can a good looking girl make some big money? Well, without going into the detail, I tried one way in a very rough looking joint but got nowhere. Either most guys ain’t got any money or I just wasn’t very good. Hmmpf, probably both. Probably in the place I was in, everyone was getting it for free anyway. Anyway, my girl attracted plenty of attention, so that was good for the ego.

I wonder... if any RL girls are reading this they are probably thinking “Ewwww.... gross”. But I was proud that my girl had all these randy guys drooling all over her. Maybe it was highly unlikely that a classy looking chick would turn up in a place like that. Note to self: avoid those places, as a real girl probably wouldn’t go there (I’m guessing). One thing I have learnt is: when you are a girl, don’t check out all the hot babes. Look at a buff guy occasionally.

Who is this girl?

2007-02-14T20:46:00.000-08:00

OK. There’s this girl I know in SL. She looks great, she’s wickedly sexy, but she’s a little bit insecure and is having trouble attracting the attention of the opposite sex. I am starting to like her, but there’s a problem. The girl is me.

Is she me? Is she my feminine side? Or is she just some fantasy dream girl I have made up in my head? She’s not just in my head of course - she’s out there in SL. Real people can look at her, talk to her. Be rude to her, be nice to her. Yes, realistically I would have to say she is just my fantasy girl. She probably doesn’t know it, but her role in life is to look sexy for me. Because she’s my fantasy. Wow, how weird is that. I have made a real fantasy girl.

Now here’s the complex bit. She’s more than a picture in a girly magazine, or a web pornstar. As I said above, she interacts with people, she has thoughts, she has plans and frustrations, all in the SL reality. Unless those people at Linden Labs are freaking geniuses, she doesn’t really have those thoughts at all. Obviously I am projecting my own thoughts on to her as I try to navigate her around being a woman in SL. But in some way, they are her SL thoughts. I don’t walk around RL wondering why men aren’t talking to me, or where to get suspenders from (what a ridiculous mental image!). She only has those thoughts when she is in SL. So I feel like they are her thoughts.

And I want to be with her.

Taking my woman out into the world

2007-02-14T16:10:00.000-08:00

It was time to let her loose into the SL world, to see what would happen. I had read how SL girls get hit on all the time, and I thought it would be interesting to see if that was true or not. So off I wandered. The first thing I noticed was how guys stare at you. In SL, you can walk past a guy in the street, and they noticeably pause and you can see their rubber-neckin’ heads swivel around. Oh well, I don’t blame them. Did I mention that my babe was HOT? But no one talked to me. Perhaps I was so beautiful that guys were scared to talk to me? [note to psychiatrists: starting to interchange “her” with “me”]. Was I doing something wrong? Perhaps RL girls have some trick to make themselves look approachable. Hell, I don’t know. I don’t look like a hooker, just a classy, sexy babe. Maybe I was in the wrong spot. I went to a night club and wandered around the dance floor full of couples dancing. Nada. I sat next to some nice looking guy on a big leather sofa. Nix. He got up and left after a minute of just sitting there. He didn’t even look at me as far as I can tell. Bastard. Do women hate it when their beauty goes unappreciated, or do I just imagine they do? Of course they must. I wasn’t going to initiate a conversation with any guys, that would be un-feminine (I suppose). I wanted to appear as “real” as possible to the guys. I had to watch out I didn’t look like a girl but talk like a man. I guess walking up to a guy and saying “I suppose a f***’s out of the question?” wouldn’t get me too far.

Why the hell was I doing this? I’m not in the least bit gay - I don’t want to strike up a relationship with a guy. I just wanted the SL guys to acknowledge that my girl is beautiful. [stares off into the distance and thinks for a while...] Jesus, I think I’ve got it. I made her, and she is beautiful. I wanted to tell her she was beautiful. But I’m out here in RL, and she’s in there, in SL. So if I couldn’t tell her, I had to get other guys to tell her she was beautiful.

What the hell is this - “tell her she was beautiful”? She’s not a real person. Yet she looks (pretty much) like one, she talks like one. She has the same desires (to be appreciated). She hates rejection. Woah, time to let my head chill out a bit, and let the psychiatrists finish their furious scribbling.

What does it mean to be a woman in Second Life?

2007-02-14T15:13:00.000-08:00

Hello. This is my tale of what is going on in my head as I explore the Second Life (SL) world. If you don't know what Second Life is, I will give you a brief intro below so you know what's going on, but you’ll find plenty of information about it elsewhere. If you don't want to read an intimate, personal, maybe disturbing but nonetheless intriguing account of how SL is messing with my head, stop reading now. Psychiatrists may queue to the left, interested readers to the right.

SL is a virtual 3D world where you have a 3D character that literally walks around in 3D cities and can meet and chat to people who are other SL “players” from all over the world. You can build and buy houses, furnish them, go to shops, night clubs, buy clothes, dance, have sex, gamble, the list goes on but you get the idea. It's a hugely rich virtual experience. Now here's the important bit, for my tale anyway. You can make your person (your avatar, or av) look like whatever you want. There are a huge number of settings to control the appearance of your av, from height, hairstyle, skin color, right down to the width of that little cleft thingy in the middle of your top lip. So you can pretty much make your av look exactly like you want. And you can be a man or a woman. Oh dear.

Now a smidgin about me. I am a married man, totally straight. Now you know what's coming, right? That's right, in SL, I am a woman. Not the first trans-av, and not the last either. Of course, I want to remain anonymous in real life (RL), as well as in SL. You’ll find out why later... Understandable enough, I think you’ll agree.

When you join SL and walk around for the first time, you quickly see that most of the other people there look totally hot. Guys are mostly all muscles, and girls are mostly gorgeous bimbos (hell, who would choose to be ugly in a fantasy world?). Now this lead me to think “hmmmm, let’s see how hot I can make a girl look by signing up as a female”. So that’s what I did. I signed up as a female with a generic female appearance and clothes, and starting tweaking the settings. You can get a few free basic items when you join up (you have to pay for most things), and I quickly found a free “sexy” skin, “sexy” eyes (read heavy makeup) etc. I spent a fair bit of time on the physical appearance, and in the end, she looked perfect. Perfect to me anyway, and being a normal red-blooded male, probably perfect to a lot of other guys as well.

“Goddam it, she looks hot!”, I thought. But she needed some better clothes than daggy jeans and a blouse to show off her beauty, so I fitted her out with some free lingerie I found, and put on some slightly dressier clothes over the lingerie. She was a beauty alright, but there were still some things missing. For instance, she wasn’t exactly “anatomically correct” if you know what I mean. She was just a beautiful store mannequin, or a Barbie doll. And I really wanted to put some sexier lingerie on her. You know, suspenders and all that. But here she was. And she was beautiful.