There's been a bunch of talk in this class about parasocial relationships, which are essentially a strictly one-sided relationship where, often times, one person in the relationship doesn't even know about the other.
I never gave these relationships much thought, as I don't really try to immerse myself in the life's of very many celebrities. However, I have started to think I have a parasocial relationship with something I've (up to this point) have really taken for granted, my guitar.
You see, I brought my guitar home last weekend for it to be worked on. It had some issues that needed to be dealt with, and I thought that I could go ten measly days without it. It seems I was wrong, as I've really been missing it. I can't tell you how many times I've reached for it, only to realize I'm grasping at air.
All my woes aside, it got me thinking. Do we develop parasocial relationships with our belongings? Maybe this has already been brought up, but the more I think about it, the more objects I can label as a parasocial relationship in life. Phones, wallets, keys, guitars, we can become attached to almost anything.
Some of these things are stuff that we often refer to as, "Things we can't live without." That's pretty drastic, isn't it? We must care deeply for these objects. They don't care about us, they physically can't.
Now maybe it's a different type of parasocial relationship. I don't know everything about guitars the way one might know everything about John Mayer, and I certainly don't sit in my dorm caressing guitars because I miss mine so much. Although, I know people that probably would.
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