Rob Greenlee reflects on how mobile technology and pandemic isolation have replaced the face-to-face community he grew up with. Kids now spend more time on screens than outdoors, and lingering fear of disease keeps people from gathering. He finds hope in his neighborhood's park, where benches and open yards still bring people together.
Chapters
But back in those days, I really felt a stronger sense of community and connection and how people really put themselves out there and actually went out into the community and really, really participated. And I think that a lot of this gets back to the growth of the popularity of technology and online connection. A lot of people have replaced their human one-to-one connections with the human-like connections that they get through, let's say, their mobile phone or their devices. And it's not quite the same thing. And I do think that, you know, kids when I was growing up actually felt safe to go out and do things outside of the house. But now I think lots of kids stay inside the house and play video games or they're on their computers or on their iPads. And not really getting out as much and thus not hanging out with their friends as much. Though I do live in a community myself that has been able to hold on to some of these values. You know, children in my neighborhood do ride their bikes and play out on their front yards of their houses. And, but you know, I'm out here in a, in a park, right, that has park benches and has public facilities where people can get out and actually get out in nature and really spend human-to-human time together. And I just don't see people doing it. I just don't see people really getting out of the house much. I find it even with myself, and I do have to wonder if part of the issue is after the pandemic, we got used to kind of pulling back and being, being a little bit more self-focused because maybe we felt fearful of the world, how the there were dangers out there. People could give me a disease or they could give me a virus.
