When Betty met Pip – Meeting your Instagram Friends

The internet is a wonderful thing. It’s weird (and a bit sad) to say that I literally don’t know where I’d be or what I’d be doing without it. Hell, I don’t even know who I’d be hanging out with! After all, I met my first serious boyfriend on Myspace, my business partner on Twitter and all but a few months ago, I met my Orange haired soul sister on Instagram. Stranger danger? Don’t think so. Now we have reached peak internet, the saying ‘a stranger is just a friend you have never met’ has never been more true, and long may it continue!

Back in the dial up years, we thought it was mainly creepy middle aged men that lurked around yahoo chatrooms waiting to prey on innocent. Parents everywhere were petrified about what lay underneath the world wide web and the dangers that would come when girls and guys everywhere first met their ‘friend from the internet’. Along with high speed broadband, a lot of things have changed since then, including the amazing discovery that there are people, actual nice people on the internet too, and they want to be your friend.

I follow 758 (at the time of typing) people on instagram and I pretty much class all of them as friends, whether I have even met them or they know me or not. After all, I know what they had for dinner, who their friends are, where they’re going on holiday and received all the fashion and beauty advice since we first followed. When someone new starts to follow me and I see them on my feed I always end up visiting their page at some point to see if we are a ‘match’ I guess you might say. I’ve met a few of my ‘internet friends’ in real life now, and it’s incredible when the connection is as strong as the 4G that connected us in the first place.  As soon as I clicked on @PipJolley’s profile, I almost did a double take at a picture of her with some cat eye glasses. With her enviable vintage collection, stunning jewellery (her own label no less) and love for everything bright and kitschy, it was clear from the get-go that we should be friends. We don’t just have instagram to thank, it was all about the colour orange and all it’s glorious shades.

After first following, it wasn’t long till we met. I am in London quite often for work and after a nip around Topshop and a tour around some press events we found out that we pretty much lived the same life, right down to our limited edition Laura Ashley Raleigh Capris bikes. Since then, our long distance friendship has blossomed into something so special. We’ve stayed at each others houses, exchanged life stories and been an ear when we need it most. We’ve even gone as far to coordinate outfits when we hang out together! Twinning is most definitely winning when it comes to BiP (yea we’ve went that far…).

Meeting friends from the internet is beginning to feel all too normal, maybe that’s because it’s how things are happening now, but I wouldn’t have it any other way! Have you met any of your internet friends in real life? How was your experience?