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Vice Blog

NEW YORK - WHEN YOU'RE GOOD AT THE INTERNET

Here is the problem with being really good at the internet. I am not on speaking terms with any of my exes, but in about four clicks I can find out who they are sleeping with, who they are talking shit about, and if they are making veiled attempts to communicate with me on their blogs. OK, they're probably NOT trying to secretly communicate with me through their blogs, but I am going to over-analyze everything just in case.

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I was just lurking a lot of people, and I came to find that an ex of mine is Facebook friends with someone who I slept with and was shitty to a long time ago. Having little to no impulse control, I was moments away from typing an email to my ex asking, "Do you know that I fucked this girl?" But I stopped myself because the joy of making a completed line from point A to point B in a map of gossip is not worth her thinking that I'm a crazy person. And speaking of internet stalking … just because I want to know what everyone is doing at every moment of the day--wondering if they miss me, wondering if they think I miss them, wondering if they still think I'm the best lover ever--that doesn't make me a stalker. That makes me a snoop, and there's a difference.

In my mind, anyone who I have ever kissed, ever, is MY person--forever. Even if we hate each other, even if I never really liked them much to begin with, even if they're dating someone who works at the Yarn Barn now, If I liked you once, you will live in me for eternity. So isn't it a refreshing and freeing concept to be able to just message someone you made out with two years ago (once) and say, "Eww, that girl you're dating just isn't for you. She looks like she smells funny"?

I log into my email at ten-minute intervals, just waiting for cryptic messages from people in my past to pop up--and they never do. What is wrong with people? Doesn't anyone value really odd and strained intimate connections anymore?

One time I thought that an ex of mine left a MySpace (yeah, this was a while ago) comment on some skank's profile about me being a nut bag. I silk-screened a T-shirt with what she wrote in that comment, word for word, and wore it to a dance party that night that I knew they both would be at. I made a point of sashaying around the dance floor, really close, like moonwalking and shit, right to them so they could read the shirt loud and clear. Turns out that the comment had nothing to do with me. And that made it so much funnier!

CULLY JACKSON