Close Enough

YouTube is mostly unwatchable trash for me. Prank videos from morons, endless Let’s Plays, comment sections that are just pure vitriol. I don’t know why anyone spends time on it.

But vlogs—I could watch vlogs all day. There’s something about it that just works. You follow someone around for a few minutes, watch them exist in their space, see their day happen. You’re not actually in a relationship with them, they don’t know you’re watching, but you get to exist in their world for a bit. Then you close the video and that’s it. Nobody has to deal with anybody. Nobody gets disappointed.

Especially when it’s someone beautiful. I’m not going to dance around this one. There’s something about watching a pretty woman move through her day—how she talks, how she carries herself, what she does with her time—that makes you feel like you’re close to her. Like if you watched more you’d know her. You won’t, obviously. But while you’re watching, it feels like you do, and there’s something about that feeling that just works. You’re not alone. She’s not some distant thing you can never reach. You’re existing in the same space, sort of.

It’s the best parts of being with someone without any of the worst parts. All the closeness and want and intimacy without anyone having to actually do anything. You get to care about someone who can’t hurt you because the whole thing was never real to begin with.

I don’t know if that’s sad or if it’s just what the medium is designed to do. Probably both.