In a recent post I noted some of the positive things that have or will emerge from the Coronavirus pandemic. One of the MOST positive is the impact that social distancing, closed schools and quarantining is having on COMMUNICATION among family and friends.
While I will admit that I texted my wife the other night while she was sitting in another room in the house instead of getting off my butt and going to speak to her directly, I partially justify this because it’s actually far more efficient.
Let me explain. Were I to wander into the room where she is to ask a question directly, one of two things would occur: either a) I will ask my question and no matter how clearly I do so, she will ask me to repeat it, or b) I will speak loud enough to get her attention so she will hear me the first time immediately to be told, “I’m right here, stop yelling at me!”
This is in GOOD times. Now that we are both stuck at home, essentially quarantined, and have had to figure out how to communicate with one another, we had to have a conversation about YELLING! She thinks raising my voice above normal conversation is yelling. I think anything less than speaking at a normal decibel level when the tv or microwave are on constitutes mumbling under one’s breath. She refuses to “yell” and we both get frustrated having to ask one another to constantly repeat ourselves. Texting, on the other hand, has that blissful silence about it while still getting the question out and/or the response back! And ALL UPPER CASE is only ‘virtual yelling’, not ‘actual yelling’!
So one of our first conversations as we sat at dinner since being quarantined involved talking about talking. Yes, talking about talking. With no ambient noise except for the dog panting nearby we could actually hear one another, and despite having vastly different definitions of what constitutes communication, yelling, mumbling, etc., we, in fact, actually TALKED to one another! How cool was that?
We agreed to disagree, but when she did start “yelling” at me I COULD HEAR HER! Yay! Now, if she could just take that “I’ll speak up but I’m going to kill you” tone out of her voice, we may be able to avoid texting to one another while in the house altogether!
On a serious note, having families confined to quarters is forcing us to interact beyond email and texting. It’s forcing us to deal with one another in what are now unusual ways. Used to be we talked over dinner routinely, or had one-on-one time with our kids at some point before bedtime. Now we talk in both these cases, and even over breakfast…and sometimes even during the day. What a novel idea!
As for friends and family. We still use email, text and Facetime or something similar, but we do so deliberately: to check in, to coordinate plans, to engage in one-on-ones by phone because we’re really concerned about one another. We’ve always been concerned about one another…but now we mean it!
And that’s a good thing. We’ve relearned that what really matters are family, and friends, and neighbors. We’ve relearned that when we’re all in deep yogurt, we can and need to help one another out. In our community I’m partially surrounded by Leftists who in good times have warped values and moronic ideologies. But today, they’re just neighbors sheepishly venturing out on their front lawns to say hi from afar.
Let’s take this opportunity to get to know one another again. Let’s try to remember that we like one another even when communicating may require us to YELL! And, let’s hope that when this is all over we’ll not forget whom we got to know while we were fighting the virus war together!
