We’re meeting as a staff on Zoom these days and my screen looks like this
Thank goodness there’s a “Stop Video” button because the combination of about a liter of coffee and about three and a half hours of zoom meetings is wreaking havoc on my bladder.
A few weeks ago this was surreal, now it’s starting to feel like the new normal. (Does that make Zoom the new black?) Of course, the larger meetings feel like I’m watching some weird version of the Brady Bunch. But I’m starting to get into the smaller ones. It is amazing to interact and even do some work. I’ve got weekly staff meetings, two weekly regional meetings, and a meeting that I’m administrating. On top of that we’re Zoom-ing with our small group on Sunday nights. Even though it’s choppy and stilted, and even though we tend to talk over each other accidentally, it is a measure of connection, and I’m grateful for it.
Having said that, yesterday I saw a friend! We talked for twenty minutes from a proper social distance (well it was more like 15 feet, so at least 2 times proper social distance). It was startlingly refreshing to have a real, live, face-to-face interaction. (Or should I say, mask-to-mask?!). There was no lag. The visuals didn’t get choppy, and the audio didn’t get garbled. It was beyond high definition and I think there’s something about proximity that makes a difference. Maybe it’s spiritual. Maybe it’s something having to do with all the nonverbal communication that’s happening, I don’t know. But with means something to me.
And this makes me grateful for those I am able to be with right now.