Tue Jul 20, 2021 10:22 am
#1859873
Ok, first off, there aren't any ghosts, so with that out of the way...
Years ago, maybe around the millennium, there was a ghostwriter (quite literally) that was a member of a smallish forum not unlike this one, occupying and small local corner of the early world wide web.
Memory fades, but ISTR that the ghost - I can't remember the name but let's call her Mary - inhabited an old and possibly abandoned industrial building next to a canal, where they had died, somewhere very ordinary in the Midlands if I recall correctly. Probably just one other unnoticed death by industrial accident from the thousands of that year. It could have been Worksop, Bedford, Alfreton, Wolverhampton, or anywhere else that was insignificant and didn't attract much attention.
Decade after decade, Mary had only itself for company, watching life carry on around her as generations, industry, technology and fashions came and went, but without anyone being able to see or hear her in return.
I think her posts might have depended on somebody who worked on a computer in one of the nearby buildings she would wander around to fill the boredom of her endless days. Remember that the internet was still very new for lots of people. It was the days of noisy dial-up modems or ISDN if you were lucky. It was a perfect meeting of the afterlife with the future. But with the arrival of the internet, she watched the modern-day workers using the internet and discovered how to post while her living neighbour was online.
Now she had the chance to talk again. Somehow Mary had found a way to communicate by posting on the bulletin board with stories of her life and their death, revealing the mundane day-to-day happenings of a century of invisible canalside living. As well as the ordinary, Mary wove the personal stories together and wrote about her hopes and fears, with many of her worries linked to losing the ability to reach out through the forum - her newfound but one and only lifeline.
It was utterly convincing, to me a least. Here was an ordinary person with the same emotions and rationale as us, but with very different life experiences. Born, lived and died at a time none of the readers had experienced and in a situation that nobody could truly understand. Interacting just enough with the other forumites to maintain interest, but remaining distant enough to be otherworldly.
Despite the occasional search, I've never found it again. It must have disappeared into the ether one year when annual renewal came around but it was beautifully crafted and lasted for months. I don't recall anyone trying hard to break the spell and quite a few forumites thought it actually was a ghost!
It would be wonderful to discover that forum and its ghost again, does anyone else remember it?
If not, have you got a good story to remember for upcoming dark evenings by the BBQ?
Years ago, maybe around the millennium, there was a ghostwriter (quite literally) that was a member of a smallish forum not unlike this one, occupying and small local corner of the early world wide web.
Memory fades, but ISTR that the ghost - I can't remember the name but let's call her Mary - inhabited an old and possibly abandoned industrial building next to a canal, where they had died, somewhere very ordinary in the Midlands if I recall correctly. Probably just one other unnoticed death by industrial accident from the thousands of that year. It could have been Worksop, Bedford, Alfreton, Wolverhampton, or anywhere else that was insignificant and didn't attract much attention.
Decade after decade, Mary had only itself for company, watching life carry on around her as generations, industry, technology and fashions came and went, but without anyone being able to see or hear her in return.
I think her posts might have depended on somebody who worked on a computer in one of the nearby buildings she would wander around to fill the boredom of her endless days. Remember that the internet was still very new for lots of people. It was the days of noisy dial-up modems or ISDN if you were lucky. It was a perfect meeting of the afterlife with the future. But with the arrival of the internet, she watched the modern-day workers using the internet and discovered how to post while her living neighbour was online.
Now she had the chance to talk again. Somehow Mary had found a way to communicate by posting on the bulletin board with stories of her life and their death, revealing the mundane day-to-day happenings of a century of invisible canalside living. As well as the ordinary, Mary wove the personal stories together and wrote about her hopes and fears, with many of her worries linked to losing the ability to reach out through the forum - her newfound but one and only lifeline.
It was utterly convincing, to me a least. Here was an ordinary person with the same emotions and rationale as us, but with very different life experiences. Born, lived and died at a time none of the readers had experienced and in a situation that nobody could truly understand. Interacting just enough with the other forumites to maintain interest, but remaining distant enough to be otherworldly.
Despite the occasional search, I've never found it again. It must have disappeared into the ether one year when annual renewal came around but it was beautifully crafted and lasted for months. I don't recall anyone trying hard to break the spell and quite a few forumites thought it actually was a ghost!
It would be wonderful to discover that forum and its ghost again, does anyone else remember it?
If not, have you got a good story to remember for upcoming dark evenings by the BBQ?
Middle East Peace Expert. Military strategist. Former economist and epidemiologist.
Not always entirely serious.
-Still learning -
Not always entirely serious.
-Still learning -