This week is the five-year anniversary of the Covid lockdown. Remember how drastically everything changed in the span of a few days?
But also: do you remember the before times, and how things are STILL different, years after the lockdown ended? Crowded events, restaurants, campuses. How much more we gathered, ate together, KNEW one another.
Adults today are the Lonely Generation. Our isolation was reinforced by the lockdown, but had been creeping up on us for years. Now we are even more accustomed to getting our social, informational and consumption needs met through screens and sans people. We scan, bag and pay for groceries ourselves, without having to interact with a worker. we type at bot chats instead of humans. We get our entertainment delivered at home instead of attending plays and concerts. Some of us might go days without talking out loud to another human being.
We pay the price for our everyday losses of human companionship in loneliness.
This week I watched the dress rehearsal for the choir instead of taking lunch. I stayed late for paperwork so I could take time to watch math students recite pi to as many decimals as they could. Sunday I joined other Roadrunners on a outing to Portland’s Moda Center to watch the Blazers beat the Raptors. We were treated to free snacks, tickets, and a very fancy bus ride there. The bus was less than half-full. I was close to being one of many who said no thanks to these sweet offerings. Did I really want to do a school thing on my weekend? I’m busy, I’m tired, yada yada. But: I knew how hard the students and staff work to put on these events. I’m always yammering how we need connection, need to talk to and know each other. So I showed up.
If we believe in the importance of a strong community, we have to make it happen. We have to take the time and the trouble to get to that gathering, even though we’re tired and think we’d rather sit on the couch and scroll you tube. We have to overcome our anxiety that we don’t have the right outfit, enough witty banter, the appropriate energy or whatever to show up.
Maybe this is true for you too: I don’t usually feel like going to things. I’m almost always glad I did. We are hard-wired for connection. We avoid it at our own and each other’s peril.
Siri isn’t going to hold your hand when you are lonely, but a friend could. Instagram isn’t going to help you jumpstart your car, but your neighbor might. Uber might bring you soup, but they aren’t going to sit down, talk, and eat it with you. Netflix won’t offer you the opportunity to run into an old friend when you watch that movie at home.
If we want community, if we believe isolation and loneliness is bad, we have to walk our talk, even if it’s a stretch.