Exploring Human Connection In The Digital Age

i used to live in a house on the south

side of town

it was a brand new development so 270

degrees of my view was

dump trucks and skid loaders and 2x4

skeletons of future homes

but the remaining 90 degrees in my view

was of a small wooded area

in a little pond off to the east i used

to love to go over to that pond and take

pictures because

i could make it seem like i was in a

much more remote location than in my

backyard on the south side of sioux

falls

the sunsets were beautiful and there was

even a little bit of wildlife that would

show itself to you if you held still for

long enough

beyond the pond and the trees you could

see for miles and miles with no visual

obstructions aside from a few

radio towers flashing off in the

distance

one summer in particular i saw an

unusual amount of rainbows

now i’m not talking a little piece of

rainbow in the sky

i’m talking full on arches of color

across the sky and it happened often

anytime there was a rainbow i would grab

my camera and a wide-angle lens and i

would run out of the house and i’d take

a picture of it

one summer evening one of those

beautiful south dakota thunderstorms

came through and dumped a ton of rain on

eventually the storm moved on

like they quickly do and the sun began

to shine

perfect rainbow weather right having put

my family on high rainbow alert earlier

in the week they knew what i was up to

when i grabbed my camera and my coat and

i ran out the front door

as i walked down my driveway and eased

towards the trees there it was just as i

had suspected boom this big rainbow

across the sky

i started taking pictures and after a

few minutes

i sensed the presence behind me i turned

around to look and there coming down the

middle of the road was a tiny yellow dot

barefoot in her pajamas it was my

four-year-old daughter jonah she had

snuck out of the house

after me when she saw me go i signaled

for her jonah go back

inside but of course she didn’t listen

to me so i went back and i picked her up

i said jonah what are you doing she said

dad i want to come see the rainbow with

you

i couldn’t really argue with that so i

said she could stay as long as she stood

close to me

and i kept taking pictures of the

rainbow and after a few minutes

i took a few steps back and i crouched

down to her level and i framed her up

inside this rainbow and i kept taking

pictures

there was still a lot of wind from the

thunderstorm that had passed and there

was a lot of debris from these

construction sites that was blowing

around and at one moment

moment jonah had stopped and pointed off

in the distance to warn me

about a piece of trash that was blowing

towards us

i kept taking pictures soon the rainbow

dissipated as they quickly do

and jonah and i made our way back home

to review our impromptu photo shoot

later that night i posted this photo

to all my social media channels as

eddie’s social media savvy dad would do

and i went to bed not thinking much of

it the next morning when i woke up i had

found that the photo had gone somewhat

viral online

and ended up on one of my favorite

websites called reddit

it had been viewed over a million times

just that night

and on reddit it had made it to a place

called photoshop battles

now this is a place where people can

upload images and users can

manipulate and photoshop them in usually

humorous ways

and people can upvote their favorites

now dozens and dozens

of people had taken this picture of

jonah and photoshopped it and sent

it to us and posted them in this thread

we got a pretty good kick out of it me

and my family

now they started pretty tame right it

was jonah

leading her troop of black hawk

helicopters into battle

jonah and michelangelo’s the creation of

david

[Applause]

jonah as a leprechaun trying to find her

pot of gold pretty pretty standard stuff

they got a little more complex from here

though

jonah in the wizard of oz as dorothy

emerald city there in the background

jonah leading some post-apocalyptic

charge into battle on top of her tank

jonah of arc

[Applause]

and probably my favorite of them all

jonah leading george washington and his

man across the delaware

my family and i got a really big kick

out of looking all at all these

photoshop pictures that people were

making of our daughter

these strangers that we were interacting

with from all across the planet why were

they taking time out of their evening to

manipulate this photo of jonah and send

it to us because it was funny

because it was silly whatever the

meaning was it didn’t really matter to

because it gave us a lot of joy now i’m

really glad

jonah didn’t listen to me when i told

her to go back in the house that night

otherwise none of this would have

happened

we often think of little girls as cute

and sweet and innocent which i’m sure

they occasionally can be

but when i look at this photo of jonah

i see someone who’s powerful someone

who’s sure of herself

i see a brave and a confident little

girl

and as she grows up and starts to

navigate this crazy world i hope that

she can see herself in that light

and like i said my family and i got a

really big kick out of all these

interactions we were having with

strangers from across the world

and that got me thinking about all the

interactions i have with people in my

everyday life both online

and in the real world the people that i

interact with on twitter

and instagram the person that i’m

standing next to

while i’m waiting in line to get my

coffee my dentist the server at the

restaurant my auto mechanic my

daughter’s teachers

the nice lady that always waves to me as

i’m pulling into my driveway

these seemingly benign interactions that

we have with people

every day that make up a community both

online and in the real world they aren’t

insignificant

i’ve realized that they actually fill me

up in my day

these short positive interactions that

we’re able to have with each other

both online and in person they can be a

refreshing way to break up the monotony

in our day

now through all this i realize that

there are a ton of people

that i occasionally interact with online

and even see in my day-to-day life

that i’ve never actually talked to in

person

we may have connected on a social media

platform because we share mutual friends

of a shared connection but we’ve never

actually stopped to acknowledge each

other

in passing so i decided i wanted to

change that

i made a decision that any time i saw

someone out in public that i recognized

from my online

world i would walk up and introduce

myself like hello

i’m wes eisenhower from the internet

i like that post you made about your dog

wearing sunglasses at the lake and

drinking a beer last week

how are you nice to meet you now this

can sometimes catch people off guard

but generally it’s led to a pretty

positive interactions and

help me feel a deeper connection to my

community online and in the real world

and then i decided i wanted to take it

one step further than that

i made another decision that anytime

someone came across my social media

feed that i found interesting but that

i’d never really talked to

i was gonna send them a message and ask

them if they’d be willing to meet me

and have a coffee and a conversation and

if they were inclined to do so

let me photograph them when we were done

now i did this with over 40 different

people all from my local community

all people who i knew their names

probably and we would probably

acknowledge each other and say hello in

passing but i did not know much more

than that about

any of these people i wanted to see what

it would be like

to give these casual relationships a

foundation to stand on

a platform for us to grow and become

acquainted with each other

in the real world now i sat with each of

these people for at least 30 minutes

but a lot of these conversations lasted

for hours and it’s really kind of funny

to see these pictures today because

these are my friends these are my

colleagues these are people that i

interact with these are people that i

socialize with now

i wish i had a grand take away from all

these conversations that i had

but what i think i learned is a few

things we’re all connected in some way

we’re all just trying to get by

navigating this crazy planet

and trying to figure out how to live our

best lives

none of us really know what we’re doing

we’re just doing it

myself included

now my family has since moved to a

different neighborhood

where i now feel closer to my work and

closer to my community by proximity

so now instead of scrolling past that on

a social media timeline

i’m strolling past him in the park and

stopping to visit for a minute with my

family before moving on

and we know enough about each other from

interacting online that we have a base

to jump off of

i think about how what we know about

each other

from our online presence informs how we

interact with each other in the real

world

while we’re at the park or at the bar at

the restaurant

face-to-face communication involves more

than just words

it involves body language and it tends

to hold more emotional weight

face-to-face communication can be

difficult and lead to uncomfortable

situations

but those uncomfortable situations can

help create empathy and ultimately help

us grow as people do i treat the people

that i

interact online differently than the

people that i know i’m going to see in

my day

i don’t know i think i do but i also

think that these interactions and

relationships we have

can be healthy and fulfilling we’re

sometimes able to skip over the small

talk and avoid discussing

the weather and get straight to the

things that are actually happening

in each other’s lives hey i saw you just

got that job promotion congratulations

tell me about what you’ll be doing

now hey

i saw that cool art project you were

working on my kids love

art tell me how you came up with that

idea

but i think this can also be a

double-edged sword

sometimes our online connections provide

us with more information than we care to

know about each other

we can end up resenting people for how

they represent themselves online

it’s so easy to spend time doom

scrolling on social media

and leave feeling frustrated and filled

with dread and overcome with fomo

this powerful tool that we have at our

disposal has the amazing ability to bomb

us out if we don’t use it correctly

this isn’t a new idea right it’s like

all things that are good and there are

bad we can

choose how to use it

but what if we were more deliberate

about making our experiences online

more educational more joyous and more

inspiring

what if we curated our timelines to be a

better tool

to help us grow in our real lives

if we gave just a little extra thought

about how we engage each other

and purposely broadened our world

perspectives that could positively

impact

how we interact with each other in the

real world

i also think it’s important to embrace

the simple things

if laughing with a bunch of strangers

about how they photoshopped my daughter

into some ridiculous scenes and sent it

to us

via reddit so my family and i could have

a good laugh on a tuesday evening

and that’s what i’m going to do i would

recommend you do the same if the

opportunity

presents itself we could all use a

little more silliness and absurdity in

our lives especially at this moment

and in this moment in time when nearly

every person on the entire planet is

being

affected by a global pandemic

relationships

are inevitably going to look differently

but i also think that leaves us with an

opportunity both as people and

as a community this is a great moment to

reinvent yourself

who do you want to be when we fully

emerge into the world again

if we put just a little more effort into

thinking about the people on the other

end of our social media experiences

as real people our communities would be

a more connected place

and i would encourage you the next time

you’re standing in line for coffee

and you recognize the person next to you

to introduce yourself

take a minute to get to know the people

that you see in passing

a little deeper because you never know

you could be standing next to terry or

ileana or sam

or corey or mato or katrina or rahiwa or

taylor

or johnny or arlinda

and in my experience all these people

were worth

taking the time to get to know a little

get to know them a little better

thank you