By necessity, the pandemic is changing the way that we communicate with each other, and the way we care for each other. In these stories, our storytellers find unexpected ways to connect, despite social distancing.
Our first story is from computational biologist and Story Collider board member C. Brandon Ogbunu. In his story, Brandon begins to see his friends in a new light after communicating with them through a screen.
After Brandon’s story, our host interviews neuroscientist Daniela Schiller about her research into social interaction during COVID-19.
Story Transcript
By April of 2020, I had decided that I'd had enough, that it was time to get the hell up out of here. And by here I didn't mean my block on my city, didn't even mean the country. I'm talking galaxy. For real.
To do so, all I needed was a warp cell to fuel my Hyperdrive. However, to get a warp cell, I needed antimatter. And to get antimatter, I needed 25 parts of chromatic metal and 20 parts of condensed carbon. Simple enough, but in this solar system, I couldn't find any damn condensed carbon.
So here I was moving from planet to planet trying to scrounge up what I needed for the antimatter. It was my ticket to new adventures.
Navigating the universe wasn't my only challenge, however. I was trying to leave the galaxy while talking to a couple of dozen strangers into a gaming headset. That's right. I was live Twitch streaming a fancy 3D space exploration game called No Man's Sky and was answering questions about COVID. It was my way of engaging the public, reaching an audience who might not have an opportunity to talk to a scientist who studies epidemics.
C. Brandon Ogbunu is a computational biologist at Yale University who studies epidemics and genetics. He is also a contributing writer at WIRED magazine, where he writes at the intersection of science, data, and society.
Most of the questions I received were pretty good. How long until we get a vaccine? Can I get SARS-COV2 from my Amazon packages? Why do black and brown people seem they get it more in the United States?
But of course I got these types of questions. Well, I don't want to believe this 5G thing but, yo, is there any truth to it? Or, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, Bill Gates, Michael Tripps, population control, COVID, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
30 minutes or so into this Twitch channel chat, while still playing the game, I had found a planet in the solar system with condensed carbon. I mined it in abundance and exited the atmosphere enroute to hyperdriving my way out of the galaxy.
I was in a groove. Answering questions and exploring the universe.
Just as I was about to craft the antimatter and get the hell up out of here, however, I heard an announcement from the television speakers. “Hostile ships detected.”
Three pirate ships had identified valuable cargo on my ship and were attacking me. I tried to keep cool during the onslaught but the chat participants, the ones who I was talking COVID with, noticed the challenge, probably because of the shift in my demeanor.
“You okay, bro? Yo, you need to use your ion cannons.”
Months into the COVID pandemic, I was embroiled in a video game, space dog fight while Twitch streaming with strangers, answering science questions, trying to remain cool and calm.
Ooh, the sensory overload. The responsibility overload. And the associated exhaustion, something about the feeling was very familiar and yet new. Then I remembered it reminded me of what life was like before COVID had flattened all of our worlds, turned three dimensions into two.
In this new 2D world we play bingo on a screen. I talked with colleagues about the identifiability problem and how it complicates our use of mathematical models, on a screen. And then there's the people themselves. The curves of faces, gone. The curves of bodies, gone. The curves of voices, gone.
I mean when I used to make jokes at work, I could see the joke fill the air, reach different ears at different times and spread. Now, my humor isn't so contagious.
To live with COVID is to live in two dimensions. Like Super Mario Brothers, we pretty much only have a jump button and a left and right movement on a directional pad. There's no antimatter, no condensed carbon, no space pirates.
Towards the end of that Twitch stream, three old friends showed up: Khalil, Salim and Zora. We go back 15 years or so. And since that Twitch stream, I stayed and kept in touch with the three of them and talked to them relatively often.
I talk to Khalil all the time now, more often than before, and not just Tuesday at 10:00 p.m. when we used to talk about science fiction, and maybe how we should start blogging together one day. Now I talk to him on a 5:00 p.m. jog over a 9:00 p.m. cigar before a 10:00 a.m. Zoom meeting with a potential collaborator.
In our new 2D reality, I noticed that Khalil is as much of a morning person as I am. And I've learned that his job's historical connection to the eugenics movement is eating him inside. For 20 years we talked and laughed and about meaningful things, but COVID made me realize I didn't know him all that much.
Then there's Salim. Since COVID, I've talked to Salim half a dozen times. Now, he's interested in starting a hand sanitizer company. When we spoke, he was able to articulate in a way that only he can the ins and outs of how a hand sanitizer was made, the type of ethanol that is used by some brands and how he aims to disrupt it, or at least get a Black share of it.
In our new 2D reality I was reminded of how Salim is the roommate who was much smarter than I am at everything, even science. I don't know what Salim’s romantic life is like now these days but I can tell that dude definitely still got it with the ladies, I'm sure.
But in June, after talking to him several times, I noticed that he has a lisp, an actual real lisp. In college, I've watched this dude consensually and delicately talk the crown off the queen of England. And 20 years later I realized he did it all with a goddamn lisp! Before COVID, it had been 15 years since I talked to Salim in any kind of detail, back when he was my best friend in the world.
In the last few months, I've Skyped with Zora. She now lives in New Zealand. When we Skype, we blame each other for spotty Wi-Fi but we laugh just like old times. Over conference calls, I've learned that her eight-year-old son plays guitar in a boy band called The Shrugs. I also learned that they paint Dungeons and Dragons figurines together on weekends. She knew I would appreciate this because, well, I introduced her to Dungeons and Dragons 20 years ago.
Before COVID, it had been a decade since I had been walked so thoroughly through her life. This despite the fact that she is the person whose patience, love and understanding really helped to create some of the best parts of me.
She since picked up a weird hybrid European-New Zealand accent. Gone is the airy, educated Brooklyn girl that I liked. And behind a Macbook screen, I concluded that like many women of African descent, she ages on a geological time scale. So yeah, she looks the same but her eyes have changed, I now notice. There's lots of pain behind them and some of it I gather I'm responsible for.
My COVID-inspired 2d world didn't reintroduce me to three of the most important people I've ever known. It introduced me to them. With no CGI or 3D graphics, life is simple. It's just colors and pixels, main characters and bosses, prizes and levels and, in many ways, it can be just as meaningful.
To Khalil I recently said, “Bruh, they should just end the Detroit Lions.” That's how I told him I love him.
To Salim I recently said, “Hey, man. Dope new business idea. Brilliant as always.” That's how I told him I appreciated him.
To Zora I said, “Hey, I'm really sorry for anything I ever did to hurt you.” Now, apologies way after the fact can be selfish, but I thought she would understand.
To the Detroit Lions joke, Khalil didn't respond at all. His way of saying, “I love you too, man.”
Salim responded to my text with the thumbs up reaction emoji. His way of saying, “We grew apart for some reasons, and yet we didn't at all. Glad to be talking again.”
And Zora said that she forgave me. “Stop being ridiculous, Brandon. You're one of my greatest supporters and best friends, but why are you avoiding my question? You're a geneticist. I asked you if I should get my dog's genome sequenced.”
A flatter world is a different world. And when it feels like we've been robbed of our extra dimensions, it sucks. But in the COVID world, I've discovered a way to travel further and faster than in my 3d spaceship, with no space pirates between me and new adventures.