Mere Minutes: Instant Messaging

There I was at work. Desperately trying to juggle about 17 different things simultaneously in my supersized cubicle. When, all of a sudden, a blue box pops up with a name I recognize. Ttarasiewicz. The father of one of my best friends from high school. He had added me to IM a couple years back - to my surprise - and we had had a few conversations over the years. I'd get the latest news about Mike and where he was being deployed as well as tidbits about the rest of the family. Refreshingly nostalgic moments...

Today, I received the message 'wut up'. Obviously not a sixty-something year old man. 'Howdy' I answered. At first, I thought it was one of Mike's two brothers. Not people I knew - or know -well, but people with whom I'd spoken from time to time. But then he started talking about grampy and nana. Well, that definitely didn't fit since I know that this young man was talking about Mike's father and mother.

I delved a bit deeper. Asked him what he was doing. Playing Grand Theft Auto 4. Although not necessarily an indicator, I guessed him to be in high school. He asked what game system I have. I answered that I'm a computer guy. World of Warcraft is my game of choice. He told me that one of his high school teachers plays that, and that it's a geek's game. I responded that many thought me a geek. I asked him which high school. He replied, Sheehan. I'm sorry, I said. I am, after all a Lyman Hall grad. And Lyman Hall hates Sheehan. I asked him how he could be going to Sheehan when living so close to LH. He said he was living with Grampy and Nana temporarily.

We moved on. He told me Mikey was being deployed to Afghanistan. After two deployments to Iraq, he was going back again. Wow, I thought. And then he told me that Nana was having her knee replaced. And finally that Grampy, Nana, and Steve (one of Mike's brothers) said hello.

I told him that it was nice to hear about Wallingford. And that I said hello. I then began to wax poetic about how it's been more than six years since I'd seen any of them.

There came a pause.

Then, he said, 'But didn't we see you July 4th?' I replied, 'I'm not the one you saw July 4th.'

He said, 'David?' And I said, 'David... from Seattle.'

At which point he butchered my last name based on what I imagine to be a response from someone else in the room. Mike's father then took over and asked me who I was. To which I replied with my full name. And he told me that couldn't be right since the e-mail address belonged to his nephew, David. To which I replied that I had had the address since 1995.

Another pause. 'Do you mean that I've been talking to you for two years thinking that you're my nephew? What a dumb Pollak I am.'

I responded, 'Yes, but I'm Polish too. I've been talking to you for two years thinking that you knew who I was.'

We laughed a bit at the misunderstanding and wished each other well.

The oddities behind anonymity...