Sloane Crosley, an essayist and novelist, said that during the pandemic “a lot of us were living in one-woman shows, performed seven nights a week. No intermission. It’s nice to be in an ensemble cast again, to see all the players, good and bad.”
Ah yes, the bad. Weirdly, my brain doesn’t bother to register whether I like the person that I’m running into; I am just so happy to see a familiar face. It’s like if Seinfeld and Newman hugged first, yelled later. At the very least, running into someone you don’t like gives you something to take back to the group chat; like a magpie, building a nest from the scraps of gossip, I’d do anything to stop talking about my own dumb life.
For Mr. Jones, who said he also had a few instances of warm greetings for people and then remembers their actual “ruptured” relationship, the disconnect is part and parcel of how alien social interaction has become. “No one would admit it, but we had standard phrases and strategies to navigate the nuances of human life,” he said. “And we haven’t had to use those strategies in a long time.”
Maybe, though, I shouldn’t be so surprised to love an impromptu street chat now. Finding moments where the vastness of the city retreats, and the place feels like a small village, has always been one of the most fun parts about living in New York. Or anywhere, really.
The summer after I graduated high school, two friends and I got a cheap Eurail pass and went overseas. To pass the time in train stations, my friend Emma and I developed this elaborate ritual where we would position ourselves at opposite ends of the station and walk toward each other through a crowd. When we were about 20 or so feet apart, we would drop our bags. “Emma Freudddd-en-berger, is that you?” I’d shout, “What are you doing here?” Then we’d run toward each other for a dramatic embrace.
We’d do this over and over, sometimes — wow, this is embarrassing — at the same train station. It’s hard to explain why we thought this was going to get people to talk to — or, please God, flirt with — us, but we were unabashedly amused at the idea that two friends could see each other in a different country. The odds seemed genuinely long. Also, we didn’t have Instagram then.
