Page 52 of Free Heart
I scratch my stubbly chin.
Babies. Cats. Love. Interesting all the things I learned to distrust while in foster care.
As it turns out, cats are all right, and love is pretty cool—and also awful because it makes you want things like money and smiles—but babies? No way. Never.
I hobble back over to the couch and tuck my crutches down next to the coffee table. I grab my computer and start looking into the various sponsorships Adam Ondra and Alex Honnold and other famous climbers have going. Then I google my name and can find only a few things about me:
Rye spraying on SuperTopo about me, news articles about my fall, and a picture of me from a climbing competition I’d won as a teenager. A link to the GoFundMe Rye had set up after my fall. That’s it. Nothing else. No social media. Nothing to lure anyone into being interested in handing over boatloads of money to me.
Keeping a low profile had seemed like a good idea before, but now I see that those who have sponsorships also have a wide social media presence on everything from Instagram to Facebook to YouTube to TikTok.
I don’t know where to start with any of those sites.
But I know someone who will. And luckily, he lives with me.
*
Sejin
“I only knowabout the KPop side of things, though,” I say after Dan explains his plan to start documenting his recovery on social media and asks for my help setting him up. “If you wanted to know what sorts of things to put into a successful VLive for your devoted KPop-loving fanbase, I could tell you. But I don’t know what climbers want to hear…and I don’t know how to make edits or anything like that.”
“That’s okay,” Dan tells me. “I’ll figure that part out myself. I just need to know where to start. What do you like about the VLives?”
Sejin shrugs. “You’ve watched them with me.”
“I know, but what do youlike? What do you get out of them?”
“Are you going to copy KPop marketing tactics but for climbing?”
“Maybe. It can’t hurt. They’re doingsomethingright.”
I sit with my coffee for a few minutes, staring out at the mountains and the trees. I’ve cracked the door to let in fresh air, and the cats have pushed it wider, with Romeo going out to sprawl in a sunny patch in the back yard next to the hot tub. The crisp November breeze flutters his fur.
The doctor told Dan at his last visit that soon, very soon, he’d be allowed to get into the hot tub, so long as he could climb in without putting any weight on his leg. Once in the water, he can start practicing weight-bearing again. At that news, he’d looked like a kid in a candy store.
“Sejin?” he prods.
“Well, when I think about it, I guess the one thing the solo VLives—that’s where only one group member or a soloist is on camera—and the group VLives—where the whole group interacts—have in common is that they make you feel like you’re part of it too.” I take a sip of coffee, and notice that the woodpile next to the stove is getting low. I’ll have to go out to chop some more after this conversation. I’m developing some fine muscles from that work.
I go on, “Like with the groups, when you see them joking around, laughing, talking, crawling over each other, sharing inside jokes, it makes you feel like you’re sharing it all with them. Their joke is my joke now. Their friendships are my friendships. It’s very…what’s the word I’ve seen bandied about online? Parasocial or something like that?”
“What’s that?”
“Basically, it means having a false sense of closeness to a celebrity or influencer. I also watched a YouTube video where a psychologist explained that our brains release dopamine when we see others bonding—like when we watch a romance movie or go to a wedding—and so the KPop marketing plays into that. We see the group members enjoying themselves and each other, bonding and laughing, andweget a hit of dopamine. We feel good too. That’s part of it.”
“Mm,” Dan makes notes in an empty paper journal he typically uses for climbing notes. “Go on.”
I pick up Muggs and tug my fingers through his soft fur. He starts to purr and knead my jeans. “As for a solo VLive, a lot of the better ones make you feel like you’re on a video call with a friend or a boyfriend. They look in the camera seriously, talk about how happy they are to be with you, how they’ve missed you.”
Dan scoffs. “Manipulative.”
“It’s strategic, but some of it may be born out of aspects of Korean culture. I don’t really know. But it’s fascinating all the same. It works on our brains even if we don’t want it to. They’re sharing intimate thoughts and fears—but not too intimate—and granting us access to things like their hotel rooms, their kitchens, and their dogs or cats who crash the Live. That sort of authentic access to their lives can feel really…well, real.” Muggs purrs even louder. “The happiness it creates, the dopamine hits, those are certainly real enough. And what’s the harm in it? Assuming everyone’s mentally well enough to see the very real boundaries as well? Like characters from a favorite show, idols begin to feel like family, like people you know and look forward to spending time with. And the fact that they say theyalsolook forward to it? That feels nice.”
“Mmm,” Dan keeps scribbling in his pad. “So, the production quality isn’t that important. You don’t need the videos to be slick.”
“No, not really. Lives are just…live.”
“But YouTube content is different.”
