Quote - I live alone, and in this case, it's a bit late for this, but I worry sometimes that I will die and my dog will starve while he waits for the world to notice.

Ditto.  Both of my parents are deceased, and I only have one sibling and he and I aren't close at all.  He lives about 15 minutes drive from me and we talk on the phone once, maybe twice a year.  I haven't seen him since Christmas 2004, and haven't talked to him since probably fall last year.

Two years ago I got really sick and dropped off of the net for a week or so and then ended up in the hospital for 2 weeks.  I managed to send an email to my brother's ex wife (my brother doesn't have email), and told her I  had called an ambulance and was going to the hospitall, but I didn't manage to notify any of my online friends.  They all knew I wasn't feeling well, but they didn't know the extent of my illness or that I had gone to the hospital.

I don't use my real last name on the net; only a few people online know what it is, and that's only because I've known them along time and we've sent parcels back and forth in the mail.  One of my "online" friends who know's my last name had tried to email me but the mails were going unanswered, and I my phone wasn't being answered either.  He decided he would try calling the local hospitals where I live before trying to track down my brother. Imagine my surprise when the phone in my room rang  on my 3rd day in, and it was a familiar voice from Memphis :)  I was quite surprised but not offended.  I asked him to contact 2 other people I was close with online and let them know what was going on.  Apparently people in the communites I was in at the time were quite worried and were relieved to hear that I was alive.  I've since given him my brother's name, address and phone number in the event that I should "vanish" one day from the internet.  This way at least he will know why.

We are more than just "user names" and "text". We are all people and our lives are interwoven together because of this community.

Be as private as you want, but that isn't going to stop people from caring about you as a person....and friend :)

There is nothing worse than "seeing" someone daily, or "talking" to them daily, only to have them just up and vanish without a word and not knowing what happened to them.

"It is good to see ourselves as others see us. Try as we may, we are never
able to know ourselves fully as we are, especially the evil side of us.
This we can do only if we are not angry with our critics but will take in good
heart whatever they might have to say." - Ghandi