Most days.
Well.
Most days before lockdown.
I’d meet someone.
Hug them, probably.
Look them in the eye.
Notice what they were wearing.
Smell how they were smelling.
Hear how they were feeling.
Listen as they shared what they wanted to share with me.
And a result of that interaction.
I’d evolve.
Evolve.
How we evolve is an interesting thing.
Evolution because of influences I am conscious of.
And evolution because of influences I am not conscious of.
And right now.
I am pondering how.
In this isolation.
Now that the usual interaction has gone.
I am pondering how.
And maybe even ‘if’.
I am evolving at all.
The Media.
The most significant new influence on me.
I think.
Is mainstream media.
Not because it wasn’t there before.
It was.
But in lockdown it has become.
For many.
Not ‘a’ window on the world.
But ‘the’ window on the world.
And I am wary of that.
Filtering.
I am wary of that because so much of what we now see.
And what we now hear.
Is filtered.
It’s pushed through a prism of some kind.
Before it gets to me.
Zoom. Skype. Teams.
I even think that Zoom or Skype or Teams are a kind of filter.
Changing how we all present ourselves.
At least a little bit.
Changing how we most naturally ‘are’.
Unedited.
I miss raw.
Unedited.
Blurty conversations.
Fun conversations.
Conversations that used to wriggle over and under my skin.
Pop into my brain.
Make me smile.
And.
I suppose I miss conversations that influence how I evolve.
Influences.
So I have decided to managing my influences better.
Read more.
Watching less news.
And I’ve deleted the Facebook app.
Because Facebook is packed with endless layers of pointless.
Brain-numbing.
Utter.
Shit.
The Answer.
I don’t know the right way to live under lockdown.
But I do know the wrong way.
The wrong way is to slobber over the sugary shite of crap TV and the sugary shite of sugary shite.
It’s just not good for me.
And if giraffes evolved to developed longer necks because they had to eat food higher up in the trees.
I need to watch out that my eyes don’t evolve so they can no longer see in the daytime.
I need to watch that that my eyes don’t evolve so they can only seek out colourful packaging in the half-light of a fridge bulb.
Or so they can only see as far as the low glow of another silly late night panel show.
That I am watching when I really should be asleep.
Evolution.
Evolution.
I need to be careful.
Because it’s happening right now.
4 Comments
I absolutely love how you have described this missing interaction in lockdown:
Unedited.
I miss raw.
Unedited.
Blurty conversations.
Fun conversations.
Conversations that used to wriggle over and under my skin.
Pop into my brain.
Make me smile.
And.
I suppose I miss conversations that influence how I evolve.
You’ve captured in words exactly what I am missing more than anything else during lockdown. The language used is spot on.
Thank you.
Thanks Kerry.
Yes; it’s getting real now.
I’m feeling it.
Common sense does however prevail.
That sentence, ‘The world is a different place now’.
It’s true.
It is.
M.
I absolutely and completely agree.
Zoom and Teams meetings make you work so hard trying to find those elements that are missing or as you say filtered or even edited.
Every day I would usually compliment at least one person on their outfit, hair or even scent. I miss that a lot.
You have captured how I feel perfectly.
I have stopped watching the news and I am reading more. Just finished Normal People – think you might enjoy it.
Thank you Michael
I’ll try Normal People.
See you on the other side Michelle.
Michael.