Life's Little Awkward Moments

Before The Invasion of the Screens—screens on desks, walls and tables of every home, in barber shops and pubs, in every waiting room, shouting at us from gas pumps, pulled from pockets and purses to bow the heads of pedestrians or around the tables at restaurants—humans used to be three-dimensional. We spoke to "strangers," which made them less strange. We depended on our fellow humans to give us directions, tease our curiosity, provide us company. "It's how I stay in touch with my friends," a screen-user recently said, while touching only metal and glass. History rolls over us and what the hell can we do about it? The screens bring us high-density images and sounds of war, famine, climate disasters, our troubled two-party system devolving into irreconcilable tribes. We feel powerless, but we are not. Our strength in troubled times comes from each other, from the community of our fellow humans. By slowing down, stepping off the digital treadmill, taking the time to really listen, study and understand other people— feeling empathy for them whether they deserve it or return it or neither—we can make our own history. The entertainments herein are fictionalized versions of events that I have witnessed or heard of. They relate episodes in which individuals were at their most vulnerable and revealing. They are experiments in feeling empathy.