by Zachary Kauz
We don’t see each other clearly from this distance. Our messages appear silently on each others’ screens, with only the name and number above it proving we are the ones speaking to each other.
The means of our communication; the barrier between our connection. Love letters manufactured and compressed into 160 characters, preplanned and edited to perfection. Static messages have taken on a life of their own, too measured for authenticity, too organized to be conversation.
Our faceless expressions, dramatized with the benefit of endless time, have become each others’ muses. Lines of text choreograph emotional expression, forever in control where impromptu tangents and facial features may give away our honest feelings.
Perhaps I presented myself too properly; overthinking every message I sent, allowing no human error. Dead silence isn’t a part of the conversation between our devices.
I can pause whenever and give myself enough time to grasp for a topic of discussion. Our compatibility has been overstated as we feign interest in our perfectly-crafted discourse. You told me you were very different than who you appeared to be over text. The opportunity to let discussion breathe was not available to us and therefore neither was honesty.
Time ticked as conversation rebooted. Politeness produces white lies, can I become an acolyte of your interests in the span between messages?
I’m overthinking again, piecing together the best response I can, pushing myself towards perfection. We simulate chemistry on this platform.
We tiptoe around tension, mastermind ways to avoid mistakes. There is perpetual distance between us and a disconnect when we reconnect in person.
Where did our methodical symmetry go? We fidget and stumble in dialogue, no longer scripted nor suspended in digitized space. We hold the privilege to manufacture planned discussion no longer. The presence of a backspace button evades us. Palpable silence has entered the conversation, positioned between us as the discussion fails to build momentum.
Perhaps we are very different people, this hidden by the ability to pocket conversation whenever and return when we have found the right thing to say. Time is invalidated outside of physical reality, conversation is frozen, able to thaw whenever it gets around to it. Conversation need not be natural here.
I don’t know if it can be, initiated at random from our own locations, disbanded at our convenience. The fading of conversation proves as controlled as its inception. Shall we continue contact out of obligation? Or surrender to ambivalence and evade each other without explanation; our exchange of hollow feelings remains unresolved for the limitless moment. The means of our connection; the barrier between our communication.