Emmett to Joe: So how come you reckon so many folks on a web community DO indulge in protracted fantasizing of themselves having romantic affairs with celebrities or fictional characters?
Joe to Emmett: I don't think any one explanation covers all of them. But there are some who, in their lives up to now, have never yet once enjoyed the love of man and woman as God meant it to be; so it's hard to fault them for using fantasy to guess at how it COULD be. As for me, I've had that love in reality, twice...and had it taken away by death, twice. I want to have it again, if God will permit me; but play-acting at having it is mighty thin soup for me. Now, if some woman and I were falling in love in reality, some kind of roleplaying between her and me could be seasoning on the steak--but only because a REAL relationship was underlying the fun. Something similar also applies to relationships OTHER than romantic ones. Once I thought I could have a good time playing at being the brother of a girl with whom I thought I was friends; but she wiped her feet on that brother-sister bond after acting for a little while as if she honestly enjoyed it.
Emmett to Joe: Now, pardner, don't get riled retroactively. As I understand, the young lady you have in mind eventually offered a right nice apology to you, after her fashion.
Joe to Emmett: You're right, she did; still, apart from the freewheeling style you and I go in for, I've about given up on roleplaying threads. ESPECIALLY as an outlet for my real-life romantic desires.
Emmett to Joe: How long you reckon you'll go on trying to find love, then? I mean in real life?
Joe to Emmett: If God lets me have my health back, AND if the United States doesn't fall under a dictatorship that's a warmup to the Antichrist regime, I plan to keep on looking--as the joke puts it--for as long as I can remember why I'm doing it.