I reported for jury duty a couple weeks ago. It’s probably my tenth time in the past 45 years since I was first summoned in my early twenties. However, this was the first time I’ve served that we were allowed to bring cell phones into the courthouse. Quite a perk!
Other years, I was in no-contact status with the world while waiting in the holding room, so it was nice to be able to text others. Except, there wasn’t really anyone I wanted to bother with my trivial thoughts. I didn’t feel like interrupting people with boring status updates since my friends and family are so busy with lives of their own. But it did make me think back to a time when it was normal to text one significant other throughout my day.
That’s one thing I’m still not quite used to after all these years. Being completely alone in a world where I used to be connected to one special person. It used to be nice to be joined to someone, tethered to another person who cared.
But since Rick died, I’m out here in the world alone. And that morning waiting with all the other potential jurors who were quietly tapping away to significant others on their cell phone keyboards, I felt disconnected.