The opportunity I have to respond to people who comment on the channel Off the Left Eye is a sweet one. Yet it is not so homogenized that everyone is a fan. Among the seekers, and downtrodden, there are the argumentative ones.  I do not know their real names, since the tradition on such platforms is to invent a persona. They give themselves playful handles like lightbeing and Jung at heart. Some go so far as to use copious punctuation and all caps.

It is fascinating to me to engage, or sometimes not engage with them. There is absolutely nothing to be gained by wrangling, or convincing anyone. Threats are as meaningless as shadows, and yet sometimes writers take chunks of their precious day to compose them. It behooves me to detach from what presents itself as an emergency, and wish this person well. 

These conversations bear a striking similarity to the ones in my head, with voices that refuse to identify themselves. Maybe I should label them myself.... Debbie Downer... Fearful Freddy... Failure is My Fate. Often the debates are reruns, and one might hope that higher intelligence could kick in and dismiss them out of hand. But so far it hasn't happened. 

Having the distance between me and strangers around the planet offers a margin in which to observe those conversations closer to home. It invites me to feel young at heart.