Farewell my imaginary Substack friends.

My imagination is running wild on Substack. Virtual relationships are new to me, and I am literally making it up as I go.

I have been engaging with a Substack writer on notes for a while now. I will call her Angela. She regularly and enthusiastically likes my notes and comments on my posts. I like to think of her a friend. She has not revealed much about herself. In my mind she is Scottish, a Scottish grandmother to be exact, who has spent her life on a croft, weathering the storms (both physical and mental) and now she is retired, living a quiet life in a warm, homely flat – closer to her sons and the ‘wee’ grandkids she adores so much.

Angela has never once given any indication that she is Scottish or that any of this is true. In her profile picture she is not dressed in tartan, surrounded shortbread and haggis, enjoying a dram of malt whiskey. I built this narrative in my head (based on a small photo and not much else). A narrative which has recently been completely shattered by the discovery that Angela is in fact American. She has probably never even heard of irn-bru (not British? Google it), doesn’t know what a ‘croft’ is and is certainly not living the life I imagined for her. I feel like I have lost a friend.

Angela is not the only person I have made incorrect assumptions about on Substack. There is another guy, I will call him John, who often comments on my notes and posts but reveals little about himself. Rugged looking fella, manly face, never smiling, piercing eyes fixed on the camera. To me John is American. Not just generic American but from the ‘south’, says ‘y’all’ and ‘dang’ a lot. Bit of a maverick – loves the road open and his emotions closed.

Of course, none of this is true. Just found out John is Welsh. He has probably never said ‘dang’ in his life. No idea about his personal life – I made it all up. However, I can’t help but feel sad that John is missing out on the life I always imagined him to have.

Substack is my first real social media experience. I have a Facebook account which I rarely post on – the odd birthday message to a friend is the limit of me. I only have an Instagram account because my daughter was too young to have one and wanted to follow Taylor Swift. To date I have posted one photo on ‘Insta’. Of my cat. I could never log into Twitter/X as my password kept locking me out (more of a blessing than a curse methinks). Thankfully I had bagged my husband before the introduction of internet dating. I can’t imagine the mess I would get into with that.

Substack is the first place I have met ‘virtual’ people but the lack of ability to connect in the way I do IRL (learned that this week), is playing with my mind. I am filling gaps of information with interesting narratives that create a ‘wholeness’ to the experience (even if the wholeness is completely fake). I am not a digital native. This is a whole new way of being and I am learning as I go.

So please be patient with me. If I assume something about you its only because I want to know more. Because I crave the familiarity I have IRL (oh I am so pleased I have learnt that one). Goodbye to the Angela and John that never really existed and hello to the real people you are. Hello to all my new ‘virtual’ friends – I look forward to you filling in the blanks (because I have plenty of frankly batshit ideas if you don’t).

Angela’s imaginary grandchild. What a cutie!