Duh*Squared

Welcome to my page for My So-Called Life, the TV Show. You can find out about this great show at MSCL.COM. This show is my absolute favorite of all time, and that is mainly because it made me feel. It made me feel understood, and sad, and happy and angry and frustrated and I could go on *smiles* all at the same time... It is the best show that has ever been recorded. I am very lucky to have the official DVD's that were sold a few years ago, and as far as I know, are not being sold anymore. So hopefully in time I will have a chance to watch this amazing show again :)

So how did MSCL and my story collide? Well, I didn't hear about MSCL until 1995 when I started watching it on MTV. My older sister Sheila actually started watching it first, and although at first I tried to be difficult and said it was a 'stupid show' merely because Sheila liked it (we hated it each other at the time), in a very short space of time I really loved it. Then I started watching it all the time, though I had to hide it because everytime Sheila saw me watching it she declared that the only reason that I liked it was because she did. *grin* What she didn't realize and didn't understand was that usually if she liked something, i tried desperately NOT to like it, because I wanted to be different from her. But in this case I did not succeed. I went to the University of Eau Claire in the fall of 1995, and continued to watch My So-Called Life. In fact, the show became so important to me that I even taped the show when i couln't watch it! If you knew me, you would know that this is just not something that I do - I rarely watch tv, and if I do watch tv, I only watch little bits of it. I do, however, watch movies and dvd's *grin*

but anyway!! back to my story hehe My boyfriend and I used to have fights over the show because it was so important to me, and because I wanted to tape it in order to watch it later - and as soon as I got back to my dorm room, I would watch the episode from that day. My boyfriend asked me (well, ordered really) not to watch it anymore because he felt that it was taking over his spot in my life, and it was at that point that I realized just how important this show was to me, and how much it 'talked' to me and helped me with my life. To make this clear as well, my boyfriend at that time was a control freak, he had to control everything that I did, everywhere I went, etc. He would even check up on me with my friends, and he did that even after we broke up.

It was because of this revelation though that I looked online about it. At the time I was just getting into emailing people and going to websites, and I thought it was all so very exciting! I looked around and found an MSCL chat list. I had no idea what to expect, but decided to join anyway. I also joined a Green Day mailing list, and I think, a Soundgarden mailing list as they were my favorite bands at the time. I quickly learned what a mailing list was, introduced myself to everyone, and everyone was soooo friendly on the MSCL list, that I immediately took to everyone! At that time we talked about everything to do with MSCL, but we also included little bits about our so-called lives as well. On the other two mailing lists I was on, personal messages were strictly forbidden which just seemed stupid to me cause isn't the whole point to get to know each other? and in the end, I ended up leaving those two. Ross and I started talking a little towards the end of 1995, and we started getting along really well. I felt like there was a 'connection' there, but at the time I was very much of the thought that 'internet love is not real, it does not happen to 'normal' people'. In December of 1995, I left university to go back to my hometown to be near my boyfriend. There were other factors involved as well, such as not having any money to go for the second semester *grin* but I didn't even really try and in all honesty I was failing out of university anyway as I never went to the classes. My roommate was also going home for her boyfriend, and it just seemed perfect at the time. so I went home... where I had no computer.

I continued to watch MSCL on MTV, and to be completely awed by it. I didn't want to miss out on anymore of the list mail from the MSCL list, so around April of 1996 I took the plunge and bought my own computer. the MSCL list became like my second family - and I can't even name all of the wonderful people that I met on that list because there are just too many, not to mention the fact that I'm sure I would forget someone who I didn't mean too, and possibly hurt someone's feelings. But it was the most awesome list, and we had the most amazing time on there. Over time on the list, everyone had started talking about THEIR so-called lives, and not so much about the tv show anymore - but that was okay, because whenever everyone had an on-topic email, everyone pounced on it! LOL

I was also having troubles with my boyfriend at this time, had to go to the police and things about him, and everyone on this list supported me through that, and really gave me good advice, and just listened to me. I used to spend hours every night just chatting with everyone on IRC. I feel all nostalgic now, but honestly it was the best time :)

Ross wrote to me around June/July of 1996, I believe, and re-introduced himself as saying that we have the same birthday (which we do, but he is one year older). I remembered who he was though, and in all honesty, in a lot of ways, I had been waiting for him to write to me, or to say something on the list, and when he had been quiet for those many months, I felt like something was missing. Anyway, it started off as one email going back and forth, and ended up sometimes up to 20 emails each day going back and forth! LOL The highlight of my day became receiving emails from him, and whenever I got home from work I would quickly log on and download my email! I would always read his messages first, and then I would wait to reply back to him to sort of 'savor' the messages. It sounds weird, but its really what I did *grin* Ross and I also started chatting on IRC all night every night, often to the wee hours of the morning in the UK whereby Ross would fall asleep on his keyboard! LOL He'd be chatting one minute and then the next he'd be gone! and I always knew he must have fallen asleep.

This went on for a number of months until one day my best friend Becky told me that I was in love with Ross, because I was talking about him _again_ to her. I refused, i said that that kind of love just was not possible, and that I had not even met him, so how could I love him! anyway, the more I went on about how it couldn't be possible, the more I realized that it was. I mulled it over for a few days, and one night when I came home from a night of drinking, I got on my computer and wrote to Ross and told him that I loved him, and that I was in love with him, and that I knew it didn't make any sense, but that it was how I felt. and at that moment I knew it could be true.

When I woke up about eight hours later, you can imagine how horrified I was! I was absolutely mortified! I was prepared to deny it and take it all back and say it was a joke, etc. but something stopped me... Ross avoided me for a day or two, and then I finally cornered him on IRC and asked him if he had gotten the message. He said yes, but that he didn't know what to say. and it was at that point that I gave up, and I knew that although I must love him, he didn't love me. I didn't really understand it though, how I could fall in love with him, but not him with me. and that's not meant to be conceited, but we were *perfect* together - we got along so well, we completely understood each other, and we were so much alike in so many ways. I stopped writing to Ross after that though because it was so painful, and two or three days later Ross wrote to me and said that he had been thinking about it, that he had missed me, and that if this wasn't him being in love, then he didn't know what was. The truth was, was that Ross had never been in love before, and in fact had never had a girlfriend at the time, so I was his first :)

We started telling each other we loved each other all the time, and the more we said it, the more I could feel how true it was in my heart. When 1997 rolled around, Ross's vow was that somehow, someway we would meet up that year. Cause you see, I am from Wisconsin, USA and Ross lived in the UK. We were both quite young and we were both poor and had no money to visit the other one. But I felt like part of my heart was missing all the time, and I just yearned to be closer to him, so I started looking at being a nanny in the UK, and after about a month found a family that wanted me to be their nanny in Aberdare, South Wales. I could only stay for six months though as that was how long visitors can stay in the UK, but I would have weekends and such off, and it would give Ross and I a chance to get to know each other. and we did *smiles* I did the scariest thing of my life and flew over to a foreign country to meet the person that I was in love with, though I had never met him! LOL I wanted to run off the plane and go back home again!! but although i was scared, I also knew that it was something that I had to do, and that if Ross didn't like the look of me, or if I didn't like the look of him, well.. at least we would know.

When I came off the plane, i saw Ross straight away, though i pretended that I hadn't. He looked soooo cute, and I worried about how I looked after 10 hours on a plane, but Ross says that I looked beautiful :) I can't say that we hit it off straightaway, because we didn't. We did in a way, but we were so used to talking online with each other, that we didn't know how to talk to each other in real life. For the first few hours, we just held each other... we couldn't get enough of being next to each other. When we finally got back to Ross's parents cottage where we were staying for the night, Ross started talking to his brother and sister-in-law, and everyone just effectively ignored me. I got really upset, said that I was going for a walk, and pretty much ran out. Ross came after me (good boy! LOL) and that was when we had our first real talk. I can't say that I heard everything that Ross said taht night, because in a lot of ways, I didn't. He started telling me about the history of the place and I was so busy listening to his amazing voice (so sexy!!) that I missed most of what he was saying. LOL Unfortunately I can no longer hear his accent now, though other people tell me its great *grin* including my sister Sheila who pretends he is Jude Law all the time!! LOL

and so the story goes.... we got engaged during the six months that I was in Wales, we got married in February of 1998, and we had our first baby in September of 1998, and our second baby in January of 2002. We have had our ups and downs since then - I think partly we've had a few downs because everything was so amazingly romantic and perfect in the beginning, that it was harder to get settled into 'regular' life, but we are still very much in love. Ross is my best friend and my soul mate, and I think it is absolutely amazing that I met him through something else that meant the world to me - MSCL.

And that is our story LOL it may not be that interesting to anyone else, but it is to me :) As for MSCL and the mailing list, I am still on the mailing list, and we still meet up with some of the people from the mailing list (in fact, I have met an astounding 35 people off of the MSCL mailing list - at last count anyway, it may have gotten higher by now :) ) and others we just have fond memories of, but the list is no longer the place it used to be. Hardly anybody posts anymore, I think there has been too much bad history on the list, too much fighting over various things that everyone holds a grudge against at least one other person on the list, and that's just not the way that the list used to be. So Ross and I are still involved in a small way, but I think the MSCL mailing list is more for memory and not for the here and now. I guess sometimes we have to let things go even if we don't necessarily want too.

anyway, that is all for now, hopefully in the future at some point I will have some time to add some more links to various MSCL webpages :) In the meantime, you can view my old MSCL Page - enjoy!