This image signifies community for me. Togetherness, sharing, empathy and support. It's colour is vibrant and it lifts my spirits.
Jailbreak #5 did happen eventually on Sunday evening. It may have been postponed 4 times but when it happened it was wonderful. My beautiful god daughter is now 16 and even though in all those years we have never had what would be called a conversation or even a brief exchange of words EJ finds a way to communicate with her smile. And on Sunday she welcomed me from under her play blanket with a happy laugh and a smile that would launch a thousand ships. She showed me her presents and we sat next to each other on the sofa and ate chocolate cake and in those moments nothing else mattered and all was right in the world. To my accomplice, her mother, thank you! It was lovely to see you too!
Today, Monday, was a day that dawned with no visitors scheduled to visit until Friday when 2 wonderful friends will be picking me up to go to the hospital. I had some interesting and very honest responses in agreement with my last post and so it was with no lesser than huge delight when I received a short message from a friend that said,
"I'll call you later."
And she did. She wanted to visit but didn't feel up to the drive. Instead we had a fabulous catch up on the phone - conversational tennis as we always do - going from one topic to the next with barely a breath. Whilst we were talking on the landline, yes the landline, we were sending photos back and forth on our smartphones of where we were sitting as we were chatting. It added an extra dimension to our call. It was wonderful. Yes, we could have done a video call however when we do that we land up reconnecting several times; the fluidity of our uninterrupted terrestrial call was a delight.
As my friend said in her reply to yesterday's post, she prefers to talk face to face and I absolutely agree however today proved how uplifting a phone call is, how hearing someone's voice and their laughter brings warmth and connectivity to a conversation that a brief exchange of words or emojis in a message cannot.
Please, do not get me wrong - I love message chats, especially with my introvert friend who 'doesn't do phone calls'. They are also convenient for letting someone know you are running late or for checking in for a very quick catch up.
Absolutely.
However, I say once again, let's campaign for a return to spontaneous phone calls and spending time together over a cuppa or a glass of wine; of being in the present with who were are with - even if that is in a message chat because a call or a visit is simply not possible. Time given without multi-tasking. Time filled with togetherness and for making time in person for one another when we can, rather than sending an email to the person sitting at the desk next to us and a WhatsApp message to our child asking if they have done their homework rather than walking into their bedroom to check.
Over the past decade, as I have trained more and more of the younger generations raised with computers and smartphones, and as I observe people of all generations and nationalities around me I have come to worry that in this era of disconnected connectivity we are losing community spirit, even in the East where family and community is traditionally everything there is. I do wonder if these increasing distances between us are eroding the empathy, the compassion we have that sets us apart from other mammals and which we need to live in a space of mutual understanding, recognition and respect. I remember seeing a magazine article a few years ago with the title,
"Evolution is slower than it looks and faster than we think.'
I do not like to think of a world without compassion and empathy or even a world where these to vital attributes are lessened. I do not mean to sound maudlin and I thank you for listening to my rambling words. As I am writing here I am trying to make sense of thoughts that have been building for over 5 years in the hope I can condense them into a training and coaching platform that will help build stronger, more aware communities.
To be the change I want to see in the world I need to act. But how?