BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends

Subject: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Claire M
Date: 11 Feb 14 - 09:20 AM

Hiya,

I've a flatmate who is really clever. He refers to his friend a lot, who has neither been seen/spoken to. This friend is apparently based on his fav musician.

As a child this was a lifeline –   it even extended to characters in songs – I was always w/ them, in the forest (I love forests), under the earth / some such place   so hearing him talk about it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. I was wondering if anyone else has had similar experiences.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 11 Feb 14 - 10:13 AM

I am sure that most people have such partners for imaginary conversations, and this includes myself. Even perfectly real persons, alive and really my friends, can function thus in their absence. They may even answer more sagely in my imagination than when I eventually call them on the mobile phone - cursed be it!

My deceased mother addresses me in my dreams, not always pleasantly.

Characters from religious tradition, fiction, poetry, songs etc. frequently turn up in people's imagination, in various degrees of realism. Many (though not I) converse with God, Jesus, the Virgin, Muhammad etc. asking them for advice, even if they do not believe that these actually work miracles upon request.

I know a successful gentleman, perfectly anchored in reality, who told me his secret: since his childhood, he often asks himself (though not the character) what The Valiant Little Tailor would do.

The point is: now act in real life, in genuine interaction with alive people!

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Ebbie
Date: 11 Feb 14 - 10:19 AM

Wally Hickel, a (now deceased) governor of Alaska once claimed that he consults a little man who perches on his left shoulder. I find the idea charming, if a little over the top.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 11 Feb 14 - 11:48 AM

Shortly after the Coronation, I began talking to the Queen, both in my dreams and in my head during the day. I wasn't sure if I felt I was her, or just talked to her. I sort of 'knew' she had a dress just like mine and a cat called Binkie like our cat. Strange. And then, I had two other imaginary friends, children called Bobby and Linda. They were just ordinary children, slightly older than I, but of course, they didn't actually exist. I was an only child for quite a number of years, so I expect I created these folk for a bit of company. My sister arrived much later and she had a 'friend' called Martin, who she informed us lived in The Black House. It was he who scribbled on her bedroom wall, and posted tea towels down the toilet. My mother coped by telling her that she should inform Martin he would have a thoroughly smacked bottom if he ever misbehaved like that again. He disappeared soon afterwards!

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Bert
Date: 11 Feb 14 - 12:05 PM

Way back in my square dancing days there used to be a little guy who sat on the shoulder of a dancer and he would change the calls so that you would hear something different and screw up. I think his name was Kubush.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Amos
Date: 11 Feb 14 - 03:35 PM

I am my own best imaginary friend.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Feb 14 - 04:00 PM

I think that most people have many semi-imaginary friends even in real life.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 11 Feb 14 - 07:45 PM

Those who give us good advice are friends. Those who just flatter us, or give us delusional hope, are evil demons. We must listen carefully.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Leadfingers
Date: 11 Feb 14 - 07:46 PM

I keep imagining that I have got friends !

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Ebbie
Date: 11 Feb 14 - 09:15 PM

lol Terry

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Feb 14 - 10:39 PM

Sometimes I think all of my friends have been imaginary.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Claire M
Date: 12 Feb 14 - 03:11 PM

Hiya,

I think a lot of people do. I'll never get why, if tribes talk to guardian spirits/we talk to God in church, it's fine, but when we substitute either w/ a tv/book character, musician etc. we like, which has done the same job (if not better) for me, it isn't. It was always encouraged, & as far as I know caused no problems. It'd be interesting to find out whether I'm OK / not....
♥§♥

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Feb 14 - 05:30 PM

I have more *fictional* friends, like when my crowd watched ER refularly, we would talk about the characters as if they were real, gossiping about what they were doing between episodes, etc. I still do that with any show I watch regularly, right now I am buddies with quite a few forensic folk. Also characters in well-known movies like Rick of Casablanca... I have never talked nor imagined talking with friends I invented myself, though, wonder if it was growing up without superstition that did it. I hold imaginary conversations with real people in my life all the time, however.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: GUEST,Ed T
Date: 12 Feb 14 - 05:57 PM

Do imaginary Mudcat friends count?

My neighbour frequently talks to her cat and her huisband answers for the cat. A full, or semi (aka partial) imaginary conversation with a pet (friend)? You be the judge.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: frogprince
Date: 12 Feb 14 - 06:19 PM

I can hardly imagine anyone being around a dog or cat and not talking to it frequently in ways that make no "logical" sense whatever. : )

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Amergin
Date: 12 Feb 14 - 07:31 PM

I thought this was going to be a thread about facebook friends....

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Eldergirl
Date: 12 Feb 14 - 08:39 PM

Facebook friends... like you imagine they are your friends, when really, they are just the opposite?
I always talked to our cats, and sometimes they would answer, quite sensibly, with a miaow or a chirrup.
I talk back at the radio..

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Claire M
Date: 13 Feb 14 - 06:32 AM

Hiya,

I did that too, Mrrzy, & they changed w/ my music taste. If this didn't happen I probably didn't like the band (it was usually a band) as much as I thought. I was overjoyed to meet the real-world equivalent of 1 of the band members to find that they weren't really that different!

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 13 Feb 14 - 10:41 AM

I sometimes talk to my bra. I have stiff fingers and often it just won't do up. I get very cross with it, swear at it and threaten it with extermination. Then the hooks go in and all is well. My husband will be reserving me a place in a home for dementia sufferers any time soon.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Mrrzy
Date: 13 Feb 14 - 12:44 PM

Oh, I talk to inanimate objects all the time. Stay, I command something I put down precariously... and talking to pets and other companion animals and plants is totally normal for a person. We personify what matters to us so they become WHO matters to us. I argue with recalcitrant clothing, shoes, etc... but I also believe I know what Tempe Brennan is doing with her snow day.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: frogprince
Date: 13 Feb 14 - 01:06 PM

Y'know, my computer must hate me; I talk to it fairly frequently, and now that I think about it, I doubt that I've ever said one nice word to it.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: ragdall
Date: 13 Feb 14 - 09:05 PM

I talk to other drivers, (who hopefully cannot hear me). Usually it's not in a friendly or complimentary way. Does that count?

I've always talked to pets, including the birds and squirrels who come for food, but animals are not imaginary, they are real. They are very good at non-verbal communication.

Leadfingers, you have many friends and you are a very good friend. I'll always appreciate what you did for us when we visited London, including the invaluable driving lesson you gave me.

rags

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 14 Feb 14 - 03:27 AM

I love my little old, rusty Fiesta. I talk to 'him' all the time while driving. He's called Keuan. If I get road rage, I tell Keuan all about it. If I'm coming home from the supermarket, I tell him to get some speed up so the milk doesn't go off. My husband is convinced I'm off my trolley. But recently he got his own car, a Vauxhall Meriva. In spite of his mockery, I learned the other day he's called 'her' Assita. So he's just as daft as me.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Firecat
Date: 14 Feb 14 - 02:06 PM

I usually end up talking (in my head most of the time) to the Doctor and Clara. Sometimes it's Matt Smith (or Peter Capaldi, or David Tennant) and Jenna Coleman, but whoever I'm blathering to in my head, they're always Whoniverse related.

My two best friends have anime casts that they talk to, so I don't feel quite as weird.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 14 Feb 14 - 05:25 PM

Ragdall, squirrels are telepathic - you don't need to talk to them, just think to them and they will understand.

[This is the fourth time I have tried to post to this thread but for some time the other three posts didn't 'take'.]

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Feb 14 - 08:08 PM

I talk to people who imagine they are driving!

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Claire M
Date: 15 Feb 14 - 07:17 AM

Hiya,

I've always talked to various pets – various dogs were always there to lick whatever was wrong away. My thing was/is music so mine were all based off musicians. I found how important it was when @ college – tried to drop my creative side but was miserable w/o it. Started following Janni Schofield case.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: GUEST,Ed T
Date: 15 Feb 14 - 07:48 AM

I remember being in a wooded area picking wild raspberries as a lad. An old woman with long grey hair, wearing a long white dress seemed to appear from nowhere. She was talking and singing to the birds as she did circle-type dances while wandering through an adjacent opening. Preoccupied with the birds, she did not see me.

I was scared and ran home to tell my mother that I had seen some type of magical forest-dwelling lady. It turns out it was a visiting woman from a neighbouring house.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Claire M
Date: 15 Feb 14 - 09:32 AM

Hiya,

Ed T – that sounds amazing. She sounds exactly like the type of person I'd like to meet.

I'm an anxiety sufferer. I'm sure people here think I'm a bit strange but then so are they – they are not the type of people I'd choose to spend my time w/, always snapping @ me/each other re stupid things, & I never know what mood they'll be in -- which makes my anxiety 10x worse. I hate conflict.

1 of my fav tv series is Life On Mars; thinking of 1 of said character's sarcastic responses to comments helps me cheer up/laugh them off & has kept me going on more occasions than I care to count. He'll always have a place in my ♥. On the + side this place makes me look normal ☻

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 15 Feb 14 - 12:02 PM

Claire, from the dozen or so threads I read from you, I remember one single incident that I would describe as "snapping"; the poster meant to help you but was mistaken about your situation - corrected within minutes. Whenever you feel snapped at unfairly, please tell us; it may well be a (mutual) misunderstanding.

Certainly we all are a bit strange. Some of us enjoy bickering as a game, others feel they have to defend themselves or others. We must be tolerant to a certain extent, as we ask for tolerance for ourselves. Some conflicts are unavoidable, others (like all those on Mudcat) are purely optional. We can use the latter as training matches for the former, if we wish.

Imaginary dialogues may be easier than real ones, but the latter promise more satisfaction in the long run. The advantage of (real!) Internet conversations is that we can withdraw safely whenever we want.

Don't worry more than you have to, please.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: Claire M
Date: 15 Feb 14 - 01:20 PM

Hiya,

Oh – when I said *here * I meant the care home where I now live – & it's flatmates who snap, not staff.

Subject: RE: BS: Semi-Imaginary Friends
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 15 Feb 14 - 02:43 PM

I see, Claire. Diplomacy is a challenging task for anybody, and of course it is more difficult with company we cannot choose, such as flatmates, or colleagues at work. Good to read that you seem to have solved your problems with the staff; you may manage with your flatmates as well.