I know more, I understand less

So, I haven’t written here since the entire “Kate is a fake” saga that happened at the end of January. Being a bit removed from the whole thing, I realize even more how shaken I was by it. There were certainly some sleepless nights following my discovery and I am not a man who struggles with sleeping very often.

For what it’s worth, I did end up finding out quite a bit more about “Kate” after my last entry on the subject. There are multiple other OD’ers that she interacted with under the persona, one of which dropped a few bucks to do some cheap internet research. It turns out that Kate’s name is, in fact, not Kate and that she is actually of Indian descent. The life she presented on OD seemed to be otherwise relatively true –she  lived in Arizona, went to med school in the Caribbean, worked at a tax office. Her dad really did pass away the day she told me about it. Most verifiable details other than her dating life seem to fit reality.

Sadly, after discovering all of this I didn’t really feel near the fulfillment that I might have hoped for. I felt as if I finally had all the answers about Kate, I knew all I could ever know, and, yet, I still didn’t feel any closer to having any understanding of the relationship that we had with one another or why Kate would choose to maintain a false identity for years. Ok, so, Kate didn’t actually look like the supermodel that she sent me pictures of. So, perhaps that was her inspiration for creating a fake persona? But, then, I’ve yet to interact with any other Open Diarist who looked like a supermodel and none of them ever felt the need to create fake personas. It’s just not a very satisfying reason for me.

But, ultimately, what’s been obvious from the beginning is there is no discovery I can make that will make me understand the reasoning and that’s not going to change.  Really, all there is to know is that Kate was somehow unsatisfied with her life in some way and felt the need to form bonds through a false persona.

On some level I think I’m going to always question what was “real” and what wasn’t – like did Kate really have fond feelings for me or was this all just some bizarre social experiment for her? Because if it was anything more than a social experiment, it just seems like such a waste. If Kate had sent me her real picture from day 1, then I don’t imagine that our friendship would have significantly altered. I still would have been eager to go to Europe with her. And instead that potential real friendship was wasted.

At any rate, in the end I can’t say that the experience has made me that much less trusting of people, either online or offline. I’ll admit that I may be a bit more guarded going forward, but I think it’s important to remind myself that it remains true that the vast majority of the people that I have interacted with online, whether on this website or elsewhere, have been exactly who the represented themselves to be. Honestly, instead of writing all these entries about fake Kate, I should be writing entries about the Savannahs and Erins and Maireads who all turned out to be the awesomely real people they seemed liked they were. Basically, it’s important for me to remember that, the reason this whole situation has shaken me so much is precisely because it’s not the norm. Most people are who they say they are. The safest thing is to continue moving forward with that presumption unless you have a reason to suspect otherwise.

Anyway, speaking of awesome people who are real, I’ve failed to mention, oh, perhaps the biggest event that has ever happened in my life since escaping the womb: Heather is moving in with me. She began her cross-country drive on Monday and will officially begin establishing residency with me on Friday. It’s been a long journey. Lets hope we find the place we’ve always wanted now.