Alone With Everyone

Pizza and wine in the apartment, door locked, scrolling through people’s lives on screens. The internet was supposed to end loneliness and instead it just made it louder. Everyone’s performing now—their best selves, their curated moments—and the more you watch the more alone you feel. Not because you’re excluded. Because the connection’s fake.

You can have hundreds of followers and still wake up at three in the morning knowing there’s nobody you can actually call.

Social media did something weird to how we relate to each other. It turned connection into a broadcast and loneliness into something you’re supposed to hide. Everyone’s got friends online but nobody’s actually talking. We’re all in the same room but facing away from each other.

There’s a specific kind of loneliness that comes from being constantly visible but never seen. From being able to reach everyone and actually reaching no one. From spending hours scrolling through other people’s happiness while sitting alone in your apartment, knowing they’re sitting alone in theirs doing the same thing. It’s the loneliness of proximity without contact, connection without meaning.

I’ve wondered if it kills you, that kind of thing. If it compounds or if you just get used to it. If there’s a breaking point or if you just keep getting smaller until you disappear.