I’ll never know who she was.

In the early days of the internet there was an initial form of social media, before even MySpace and Friendster, called AIM or AOL Instant Messenger. It was the true Wild West of the internet back then; you search out virtually any user’s screen name and shoot them a text message. Since smart phones weee not a thing yet these programs ran on desktops and you could leave them on running all day if you wanted. It became fashionable to leave away messages when you were working, studying, or otherwise preoccupied. It was like being on the phone all day with everyone on your friends list.

One day as I was searching out random names to shoot messages to I came across Annabelle993. We hit it off famously, a charming southern gal from Hernando Mississippi. Coincidentally two fraternity brothers set up practice on South Haven Mississippi. She taught me so much about talking confidently with a woman and she in turn opened up deeply to me. Somewhere along the line we said we loved each other, but I could never get her to meet me. I could never quite figure out why, but I came to accept that romance between us would be too real.

I found the last email I wrote her in a saved file dated 2015. I still think about who that mystery woman was and how profoundly she affected my life.