I asked “what’s the most beautiful thing you’ve experienced today?” and etoile responded
probably the most beautiful thing today was someone saying hi to me
unexpectedly who hasn’t been talking to me in person. instant
messenger, sure, but in person……
it’s a strange side effect of the ‘communication revolution’…
communication is not just words, voiceless text. those subtle pauses,
inflection, whispers, all replaced by ellipses, parenthetical smiles and
frowns, font size. the telephone was bad enough, reducing the complexity
of human communication to disembodied voices….
anyway the main thing is the eyes. i just can’t feel right talking
without eyes to talk to.
eyes, eyes, eyes. oh, i miss them.
but this friend who said hi… can’t look me in the eyes anymore. they
search the room for a place to rest when i am present. but she actually
acknowledged me today. that was beautiful, even if it’s the closest
thing i could get to a real human connection…today.
and I responded: “hi Zanzibar, that’s a fascinating response. I had an experience recently where I was camping with people from work, away from any communication that wasn’t face to face. It was enlightening, and we were actually very critical of the limitations of email, IM, etc. afterwords, which is saying a lot for a new media company.”
And I just remembered what one of the Outward Bound instructors said, “We listen with our eyes as well as our ears.” It sounded corny as hell then, and does now too, but when someone doesn’t listen with their eyes you know something’s up.”