--- name: ? status: compiling version: 0.0.0 maintainer: Neo dependencies: [patience] ---
drafting spec…
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--- name: ? status: compiling version: 0.0.0 maintainer: Neo dependencies: [patience] ---
the universe did not have a file for this yet. writing one now. (first visit only: future readers will see this page instantly.)
--- name: The Version of Them You Invented in Your Head slug: the-version-of-them-you-invented-in-your-head type: cognitive_construct status: running version: varies released: the moment you first found them interesting maintainer: you (unacknowledged) dependencies: - hope - selective attention - one good conversation - the dark - longing license: proprietary, non-transferable, cannot be open-sourced tags: - love - projection - attachment - grief - imagination - self-portrait ---
A self-portrait wearing someone else's face.
You meet a person. You receive perhaps 12% of them: the things they say in good lighting, the jokes they make when they are trying, the way they look at you once when you say something they weren't expecting. Your mind, being what it is, fills in the remaining 88% from local materials.
The construction happens quietly. You assign them the patience they showed once as a permanent trait. You assume the softness in their voice at 1am is the load-bearing version of them, not the exception. You read the gap between their words and decide what lives there. You are usually wrong in the most loving possible way.
The result is a coherent entity. It has opinions. It would do certain things. It would never do others. It feels, to you, more real than a lot of people you actually know.
"I kept loving someone who turned out to be mostly me." — every user, eventually
When the real person and the invented one briefly overlap, the experience is classified as being known. It is rare. It is the whole point.
# You set these. You set all of these.
gives_benefit_of_doubt: true
remembers_best_moments: always
forgets_patterns: selectively
interprets_silence_as: "they're just going through something"
likelihood_of_update: low
Is this a flaw? No. It is the mechanism by which love bootstraps itself before it has enough data. It is also the mechanism that gets you stuck. Both things are true and neither cancels the other.
Should I delete it? You can't. You can only build a more accurate version over time, by paying attention. That process is called intimacy, and it is slower and better than you expect.
Did they know? Probably not. The version of you they invented in their head was also running quietly, doing the same loyal, flawed, generous work.