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Memory Lane

Judy Hunt

Chat, Anyone?

Almost two years ago, I started the May session of Fiction 98 without a clue as to what an online class was. The lessons were thought-provoking, but the biggest challenge proved to be the chats. At the time, my server, AOL, wasn't java compatible. The students in my study group tried to teach me about IRC so I could join them in the chats. Their patience with a computer illiterate like me was remarkable. Due to unforeseen circumstances, I wasn't able to finish the class and therefore was never able to figure out how to access the chat rooms that session.

That could have been the end of my story, but there's more, much more. Not to be defeated, I signed up for the July session of Fiction 98. I had kept notes from my former classmates regarding IRC, which helped me as I persisted trying to get to the chat room. The smell of sweet success was within reach, and finally, at long last, I made it!

In my eagerness to make it to the first chat of the new session, I was the first one in the room. Within moments, others joined. The exhilaration - and relief - of seeing the words of friendly students writing, "Hi", was awesome.

My excitement was short-lived. Although I could see their words flashing before my eyes on the screen, I hadn't a clue as to how to "talk" to them. For a while, I thought I could get away with being in the background and just watching. That was fine until they started to direct comments specifically to me. I must have appeared to be haughty because I never responded. Little did they know that I didn't know how. The clincher came when the WebDude himself, Bob Hembree, asked me to please "op" him. Op him? What the heck did that mean?

Back in the earlier sessions of Fiction 98, the first person to enter the chat room was given "operator status". The nickname for that was "op". The op then had control of the room. Since I was the first one to arrive that evening, I unknowingly was the op. So there I was, a person not even knowing how to communicate with others in the chat room, in control of it.

As frustrating as it was to the others, as they repeatedly tried to get some words out of me, while Bob tried to get me to op him, they had no idea what was going on at my end. My face flushed a bright shade of red from embarrassment. The sweat started to bead on my temples. All I wanted to do at that point was disappear into thin air.

Bob then asked everyone to leave that room and go to one of the other rooms. That way, he would be able to get op status because he would be the first one there. Quiet, shy Judy was creating chaos in her first ever online chat. I have vague recollections of shutting down my computer just to leave there with some sense of dignity left intact. Sure, I could classify it as dignity because no one knew who I was. I had chosen a nick that no one would have recognized, one that I have never again to this day used.

I probably should have left well enough alone and decided that chats weren't for me. Alas, my determination to get it right brought me back to that chat room as soon as my computer had rebooted. Thankfully Bob was at last the op, so I didn't have to contend with that. Since that was what had been causing me the most worry, I had forgotten the minor detail that I didn't know how to actually "chat". This time when I entered, I used my real name. Once again, people were friendly and said, "Hi", when I joined them. Their friendliness became distressing for me, as I was at my wit's end trying to figure out what to do. It would have been easy if I could have asked them, but if I knew how to do that, there would have been nothing left to ask.

Rebooting my computer again brought me back online, but I had sworn off ever entering a chat room again. That, too, was short-lived, and now, twenty months later, I am a regular chatter at the WVU and Fiction 99/ F2K chats - proof positive that even the impossible is possible. Keep on keeping on!