A webcam by any other name would smell as sweet.

Jeff had just announced to me that he liked me. But--here's the catcher--he was heading back home to the Midwest the very next day.  So what was the point, right? He would be there all spring and summer and I would be here in Provo, so we couldn't really take things too much further from there. I didn't have unlimited minutes, so that made talking on the phone less of an option. We could text and what not, but that still just doesn't quite serve the same function as talking face to face.

So he said goodbye at the door and headed on his way. I, meanwhile, resigned myself to the fact that this budding relationship would just get snipped before it even had a chance to bloom, and that there unfortunately wasn't much I could do about it.

But later that evening, the doorbell rang.

I opened the door, where I was startled to find the person I expected to be on his way across the country. And there in his hands, he held out...a webcam.

Every time I tell this story, (particularly to members of the female persuasion) a chorus of "Awww"s and "That's so sweet!" ensue, as if he'd shown up on my doorstep with the largest bouquet of long-stemmed red roses the world has ever seen.

It makes me chuckle a bit to think that a webcam has become something romantic. But I have to admit, it was one of the best gifts I've received. Not simply the webcam itself, but what followed with it. Because of  the webcam and my subsequent downloading of Skype, Jeff and I could now see and talk to each other on a regular basis. In the beginning, we only talked a couple days a week, but before long it turned into a part of the daily routine. We were able to get to know and appreciate each other even better to the point that by the time he moved out here to Provo for school we had come to a point where we were already dating.

So often we hear how technology is detrimental to social interactions and real-life human relationships. But in my case, technology proved beneficial to my relationship. You could even say that it is what made it possible.

Certainly, people have had successful long-distant relationships without technology for centuries. But I feel that having the ability to actually talk face to face (like you do with a webcam) has a greater influence and stronger affect on helping people really know each other as they would in "real life" than if they simply write to each other.

In many ways, people who are apart actually have closer relationships today than they did before we emerged into this new digital culture of ours. My mom, for example, says the fact that we could email each other every week of my LDS mission to Denmark, plus having the chance to Skype me at Christmas and on Mother's Day, kept us closer together and made it not feel like I really lived on the other side of the globe.

In another blog, "Glimmerbomb" addresses this issue even further as she discusses the benefits of  webcams and human interactions. I found her blog while looking on Word Spy, a site the tracks new words cropping up in the English language. There I found this interesting entry:

Skype sleep

v. To create a Skype connection with a faraway partner and then fall asleep together."

This completely blew my mind. I had never heard of such a thing. Personally, I think that Skype sleeping takes it to a bit of a ridiculous extreme. But I guess it just further proves how many aspects of "real life" are propelled rather than halted by technology.

Word Spy included sources where this new word has been found including the aforementioned blog found here: http://glimmerbomb.wordpress.com/2012/02/28/looking-at-you-looking-at-me/

It also led me to this interesting site called Spark 161 which had a podcast talking about Skype sleep. As I looked further, I found that the site is swimming with podcasts all about digital culture, and will likely serve as a great go-to for me and all the rest of you studying digital culture. Check it out here: http://www.cbc.ca/spark/2011/11/spark-161-november-6-9-2011/