What do you miss? I’m missing you.

Working at home over the past 10 months of mostly lockdown has had its ups and downs.

There are days when I’m feeling good and there are other days when I’m missing company so deeply.

I can recall the evenings when there might be a networking event to attend and I wish I hadn’t said yes, I would go because I’d wanted to just stay home.  How I would love one of those events now.

So, what do I miss, well other than the freedom to go anywhere, anytime I wanted to?

I miss my girlfriends.  Meeting up for lunch or a coffee.  Catching up with how things had been at home or at work.  Imagining the things, we would do in the future.  Admiring the new pair of shoes, bag, or piece of jewellery or just talking about absolutely everything. Or just soaking up the feminine energy that fills the air.

Thankfully, I live in a house with two other people and we love being together.  My family is wonderful, but girlfriends are something different.  Maybe guys feel that way about their mates too, but as I’m not a guy in this life, I can only reflect on my female sensitivities.

So, to all my girlfriends, who understand the importance of a shriek of joy at anything new or good that we share in delight and appreciation, or the joy of a friend’s accomplishment, I’m missing you.

To all my male friends who are full of warmth, hugs, and not afraid to show your more gentle side, I’m missing you.

I miss having some really good discussions about a business idea or a change of strategy with others who see things differently from me.

I miss meeting new people.  I miss the discomfort of visiting a new place for the first time.

I miss seeing people perform, create an idea or story from just their imagination, and bringing that to life in a powerful way.

I miss the challenge of engaging with large groups of people.

I miss body language and being able to read it completely.  Watching the whole of what people are saying or not without them being aware.

I miss basic human interaction with lots of people known and unknown to us.

I miss community.

I miss human connection.

I miss real life.

All this Zoom is great, but it won’t do.

Human beings need not only to see each other with our eyes but to be in that physical space.  There is more to than, there is the combining of the intangible energy that we are all made of.  There is the mixing and mingling of presence, which is not the same in the distance of the online conference machine.

I feel that when we do get through this virus situation, and we will, the entertainment and events sector will be all that we seek.  We’ll want people to create experiences that allow us to be together in more meaningful ways.  I think we’ll all go a little drunk with each other’s company.

I think I’ll start saving now. I have a few reasons to party in mind, but mostly it will be all about an opportunity to reconnect in meaningful ways with the people I’ve missed.  The people who have meant so much to me before and during this time of social isolating.

So, as I complete this blog, we in the UK have just been advised of a third national lockdown.  It is the right thing to do I would agree.  I know that the issue is that although this one is until February; we really don’t know how long it will be until we have either found a way to live with this virus or it somehow dies away.

So, my little share is not a complaint at all.  It is a reflection of the human condition, from my perspective as a woman, in the main, missing one of the experiences that made her life even more pleasant.

What have you missed most during these times of social limiting?