人生三大錯覺：老師在門口、手機在振動、他/她喜歡我。
你有過上面哪種錯覺呢？
即時社交軟體讓以往現實戀愛與網戀的界限變得模糊。
有時候，昨天加的那個人，今天就奔了現。
還有時候是反過來：現實中處得不錯，放一個暑假，就成了網戀。
As we spend more and more of our lives online, inevitably we discover ourselves flirting with people we have never met in real life - you might even call it having a crush.
我們花在網上的時間越來越多，自然而然就會更容易和現實中沒見過的人撩起來，有人甚至會說「我網戀了」。
There’s something about the dynamism of social media that feels both more truthful and more mysterious. You have lots of intimate knowledge of a person but you can’t see them.
社交媒體的運行機制會讓人覺得既有非常真實的一面，也有十分神秘的一面。你知道很多屏幕那頭人的秘密，但你卻從未見過他/她。
今天我們分享的故事，讓你一窺網戀中的眾多側面。
看看翻看對方所有的朋友圈、微博是不是慣例？
以及，是否甜蜜大多相似，磨難各有不同。
01 奔現和買彩票差不多
When we would eventually meet, sometimes it was pure magic, one of these rare times in a life when everything finally seemed to fit together and I felt I'd met my other half. Other times it was… well, less magic, because the spark in the person didn't match the connection we made online.
有時候和網撩對象見面會很有化學反應，這種反應一輩子可能都少見，好像一切都很合拍，找到真愛了的感覺。不過有的時候見面就……呃，沒那麼合適，面對面的交流還沒有網聊的時候有火花四濺的感覺。
Sometimes the other person and I would feel the same way, whether we were overwhelmed or underwhelmed. Even worse than both of us being disappointed was when one of us would be thrilled while the other was not, which would eventually result in hurt feelings on both sides.
有時候對方和我想得一樣，不管是有被驚喜到還是感覺很無聊。但比我倆都很失望還要更糟糕的情況是這樣的：我倆其中一位感覺對方很不錯，但對方卻無感。這種情況最終會傷害雙方。
The first time I met an online love it was magic, and as a longtime romantic I simply assumed it would feel like that every time. So I was shocked when the second time I met someone I had connected with online, there was no magic, no spark, none of what I was so sure would happen because it had happened once before.
我第一次見網友的經歷就很棒，非常浪漫，以至於我誤以為網聊奔現都應該是這種美好的感覺。所以第二次奔現的時候就很幻滅，兩人之間完全沒有火花，根本不是我之前經歷的那種浪漫狀況。
On the bright side, she and I have been good friends ever since. And the few more times I have met someone online and then met in person some time later, the experience has been somewhere in between the first and second times—some spark but not fireworks.
不過也不完全是壞事兒，我和她後來成了朋友。後來幾次我跟人網聊之後再奔現，感覺都處在最初兩次的感受之間——有點化學反應，但並非一見鍾情。
02 糟糕，被發現了
Once I had a crush on a guy. From the internet. And I was secretly watching a YouTube video that he had posted. And my finger slipped and I accidentally clicked "like" or "thumbs up" or whatever.
有次我對一個網撩的男生有好感。然後我就在網上看他發的視頻，結果一不小心手滑，按了贊！
And this was the first time I realized that YouTube was directly, horrifyingly linked to my Gmail. So there was my face, next to a thumbs up of this video that I was secretly, creepily watching. And I freaked out. And was like "Undo! Undo! Undo!!!
那時我才知道油管帳號是直接跟我的郵箱綁定的。所以我的郵箱頭像就出現在了視頻底下的「點讚區」，顯示出我在偷偷看他的視頻。我嚇壞了，瘋狂找：「撤回，有沒有撤回鍵！」
So then I clicked "thumbs down" thinking that would undo it somehow, but no, obviously that just meant that now my face was on the YouTube video next to a thumbs down icon and it was very embarrassing, and then when we met in real life, I pretended to barely know who he was even though obviously I'd watched his video.
結果我就點了「踩」……想著應該可以抵消那個贊。但是並沒有，我的頭像只是從「按贊區」移動到了「按踩區」，尷尬。之後我和他奔現的時候，我都裝作不太了解他的樣子，哪怕很顯然我看過他的視頻。
03 看過你的歷史，我們才有未來
I started a new job about a year ago and was surprised to discover that my boss, the editor-in-chief, was a pretty young, kinda hot dude - in a hot dad way. But we never really interact in person since he's not my direct boss.
一年前我換了份新工作，很驚喜地發現我的上司——也就是主編——還是蠻年輕的帥大叔。但其實我們並沒有太多接觸，因為他並不是我的直屬上司。
But in my first week he started following me on Twitter, which I was really flattered by because he only follows a few hundred people on Twitter. Then I wrote something and he tweeted about it, so I faved that.
但工作的第一周他就在推特上關注了我，我有點受寵若驚，因為他也就關注了幾百個人而已。我發過的推文也被他轉發過，然後我就給他的轉發點了贊。
Then I realized I was favoriting quite a few of his tweets, and then things got weird where I was like faving his tweets on Saturdays, or going back to old tweets and faving those. I think I thought I was being subtle and saying "oh, heyyyyy," except it wasn't subtle at all.
後來我發現我給他的很多條推文都點過贊。之後就越來越詭異了，周六休息日給他點讚也就算了，我還翻到他的歷史推文裡按贊。我內心想的是，這是很隱晦的表示「誒，我對你有意思」。但其實這麼做簡直昭然若揭啊。
04 朋友的朋友才是中獎的那個
In 2009 I befriended a guy whom one of my other friends had gone out with a few times. Once he accepted my Facebook friend request, I naturally went to look at all of his recent photos. In his photos was another guy that caught my attention, so I went and looked at his profile and lurked behind all of his photos. "What a babe," I thought. I was immediately obsessed.
2009年我加了一個男生，我有個朋友跟他出去玩兒過幾次。他剛一接受我的臉書好友申請，我就自覺跑到他的相冊裡翻看。照片裡有個男生吸引了我的注意力，然後我就點進去看他的主頁，鬼鬼祟祟地翻看他的照片。「好帥啊」，我心想。我感覺我戀愛了。
I decided to take my virtual stalking offline by messaging our mutual friend and not-so-subtly asking for him to hook us up. Go big or go home, right?
我決定到線下去追這個男生。然後我就給我倆共同的朋友發了消息，明目張胆地叫他給我倆牽線搭橋。要麼就玩大的，要麼就別玩，不是嗎？
To make a long story short, yadda yadda yadda, Billy and I got married in December 2013!
總而言之，啦啦啦哈哈哈哈，我和比利在2013年12月完婚啦！
網戀都要奔現，只是時機早晚。
不過很多人都卡在「要不要奔現」的問題上，磨磨蹭蹭，時間一長，最後把彼此晾成了聯繫人裡只在過年會「詐屍」的點讚之交。
There is always going to be a divide, however, between our public persona(e)—whether presented via Twitter or Facebook—and who we are in the physical realm.
我們用來社交的公共人格——無論是推特還是臉書上的形象——和現實中的我們肯定是有區別的。
On social media, you get all the fun, interesting parts of someone without having to deal with the things that are difficult or dull about them. They are not presenting to you, for the most part—or at least in any way that actually affects you—their idiosyncrasies, emotional unavailability, or the way they chew with their mouth open.
在社媒上，你只會看到別人生活中有趣好玩的部分，不會看到他們生活中的困難和乏味。絕大多數時候，至少為了不影響到你，他們不會向你展示他們的小癖好、不願傳遞的情感、以及大聲吧唧嘴的樣子。
If you want my advice, don't avoid making online connections—they can be marvelous experiences while they last. But I would recommend trying to meet each other before your feelings become so intense that you'll be seriously heartbroken if that initial meeting doesn't go well.
如果要我給建議，我會說一定要建立網撩關係——如果能長久，那必定是超棒的經歷。不過我也會建議說，儘量在兩人聊得熱火朝天之前就奔現，這麼做可以避免過高的期望值在不甚滿意的初見打擊下碎成一地的情況。
Think of it as having a crush for a long time: you may idealize someone to such an extent that when you finally get to meet them, you can't help but be disappointed by the real person you actually meet.
想想暗戀某個人很長一段時間的體驗：你會把對方理想化，程度越來越深。等到最終和對方奔現的時候，見到真實的人，你根本扛不住失望的心情。
奔現最好在好感剛出現沒多久的時候，趁熱打鐵。
網聊的時間過長，可用的話題就變少，見面容易尷尬。而且聊得久了，對彼此的印象就更容易理想化，見面後「見光死」的機率也大了不少。
怎麼樣，要不要約正在撩的人明早出來喝咖啡？
Notes
flirt /flt/ v撩；調情
creepy /kripi/ adj怪異的；離奇的
fave /fev/ n特別喜愛的人或事物；（此處是動詞）點讚
lurk /lk/ v埋伏；潛伏；（網絡上）潛水；隱身（閱讀別人的討論但不參與其中）
idiosyncrasy /diskrsi/ n（個人特有的）習性；特徵；癖好
chew /tu/ v咀嚼；嚼碎
idealize /adilaz/ v將……理想化
編輯：唐曉敏
來源：Buzzfeed、The Daily Dot、Psychology Today
來源：中國日報雙語新聞微信