At first, I only overhear one sentence, but those seven words are all I need to sense a very familiar dynamic on the sidewalk of my San Francisco neighborhood. The frustrated pair, a thirtysomething son and his seventysomething mother, stop to focus on a small screen as I scoot by. In the time of the Corona, I am careful to make space for them so I don’t slow down. But as I pass, I can hear the young man ask, “Can’t you see the blue dot moving?” His measured tone conveys an obvious effort to remain calm.
Even as I quickly dart past them, the tense interaction hangs in the air and seeps into me. In that one question, I feel his forced patience and her anxious reluctance. I want to mend the strain between them. I want to reach out, to show that the blue dot moves on my phone!, and to support the kind son as he teaches his mom how to use Google Maps. But we are living through a weird time in history. We are overly worried about invading boundaries. We are crossing the street to widen the distance between people. We are having insanely high paranoia about the space between us. Unprecedented thoughts are swirling around… Are they six feet away? I wish they were further away. Are we making the pandemic worse? Are the numbers going up because we are out taking walks? When and how will this end? There is a baseline panic in the air that can be felt from the streets of San Francisco to the shores of Australia.
As I cross the street, the frustrating situation continues to unfold. The man, dressed comfortably in blue jeans and a hooded sweatshirt pleads, “See? Look here… the blue dot is moving as you move. You can let it guide you.” He holds an iPhone in his mother’s face as he tries his best to stay patient and explain how the GPS works.
If you’ve never attempted to teach a grandparent how to use an app or a new piece of technology, you might miss the desperation in his voice. But it is crystal clear to me. Please. Please. Please try to see the little dot moving. It will give us both so much more freedom if you could just understand that little blue dot. He is concerned she’ll get lost if she goes for a walk by herself, but he is drowning in the coronavirus atmosphere of his home. She never leaves. He can’t breathe; he has no space. But he worries about her. He wants her to be safe and he needs to know that she can follow that blue dot home.
The stubborn woman, however, is not convinced. Adamant that this tool is more trouble than it is worth, her body language conveys that it doesn’t work when she tries. Her son thinks, “TRY HARDER”, but he says, “See? See that there? You’re moving and the blue dot moves with you.” She nods her head, wanting to please her son, but not giving a fuck about that blue dot. She wants her son’s company on these beautiful walks around his neighborhood, not the irritating presence of his complicated phone.