Who Lives on Dark Moon?

Dark Moon has been a wonderful home for Luco and me.

Through the three years we have been together (and let me tell you, that is a LONG time in SL, as many of you know), we have enjoyed the various manifestations of Dark Moon.

We have greeted and met many explorers coming to our sim. We like to welcome all polite creatures here.

A Fae I met the other day!

Mostly Luco and I TALK! We talk and talk and talk! We talk riding on the swan boats, we talk sitting in the temples and forest, we talk dancing.

Another lovely chat

One thing I have found about SL relationships is they are (and Luco is the one who said this actually) like a meeting of souls. Without the analogical cues and information, what is transpiring is pure heart & mind. In our particular case, we are reminded of olden times (particularly before voice was introduced) when lovers penned letters to each other. One is reminded of Cyrano de Bergerac writing to Roxanne. These days few people realize the hauntingly seductive power that a love letter can have. A love letter is a demonstration of personal attachment. Many people are too self-conscious to express their true feelings in writing in RL, because writing is permanent. But what I found while researching online counseling, is that the dis-inhibition of text on the Internet seems to ameliorate this self-consciousness. Of course part of this has to do with anonymity. As a relationship gets deeper, that anonymity may evaporate! But after 3 years, Luco and I are VERY attached still.

One thing I have done here in SL is to write a weekly column about relationships for, well first, The Looking Glass, and now The Virtual Times. So I have kept up with what people are experiencing in cyber relationships. There are many variations it turns out. So I did some real research!
Of course many people have very intense sexual relationships in cyberspace as well. I found interesting journal articles on this concept too. In the Journal of Sex Research, Ross stated:

"The internet has brought a new dimension to intimacy, both by

permitting intimate contact electronically over a distance and by, through

that same contact, permitting intimate discussion shorn of most of the

social cues present in face-to-face interactions. This electronic dimension

appears to have led to a transfiguration of intimacy" (2005, p. 344).

AND

"The internet can provide an opportunity for the participant to create his or her

own, interactively, and to imbue it with intimacy, and make it an extension of a

romantic or sexual fantasy. Thus, the text can become a vehicle for intimacy "not

so much because the loved one is idealized--although this is part of the story—but

because it presumes a psychic communication, a meeting of souls which is
reparative in character" (Giddens in Ross, 2005, p. 347-348).

I truly believe that the potential for healing relational or intimacy problems can worked with in our virtual world.

Just relaxing together : )