What I Miss

 Well, here we are, just about a year since lock-down began...and the question is, "what do I miss?"

Well, I miss face-to-face communication with people. I've had a little bit over the past 12 months with a limited number of people. I was working for the first two months, so I had my colleagues and customers then. But since May, I've had occasional meetings with people from my church (the rector, the youth minister) as I assist them in dealing with running the parish under lock-down. But little else.

Even in those situations, I miss seeing smiles. Yeah, a real smile shows in the eyes as much as the mouth, but that lower half of the face is important...and a lot of the emotion is simply not transmitted on video.

I miss casual conversation. All my interactions now are scheduled, so that we all know what time we have to be at our computers...and because the technology is not up to handling cross-talk, we all have to take turns (and frequently mute ourselves) rather than have the natural interruptions and interjections of in-person conversation.

If you'd asked me twelve months ago, I might have described myself as an introvert, someone who was happy to work alone. Now, I'm not so sure.