The Final Solution: In Solitary

The Fortress of Solitude in Action Comics #846, February 2007 (Art by Adam Kubert)

Is it odd that that you can talk on the phone and zoom, but never see anyone in person? The phenomenon possesses a mythic quality. If you recall Orpheus was specifically told not to look back at his beloved Eurydice, but he couldn’t help himself and lost her. You might equate that to those impatient and restless souls who don’t realize that they and everyone else are walking time bombs. If you’re carrying the virus and symptomatic then giving into the desire to really “see” someone instead of merely experiencing them in cyberspace may be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. At first it was all a lark and some people even said they preferred zooming to actually seeing people. After all, it was easy. You didn’t have to go out of the house. Then when the reality set in, you began to realize video images cannot take the place of the human almost sexual need to be to be in the presence of real people. Virtual reality may be a craze, but it’s not a substitute for real life and so like water pressure building, the pipe starts to feel like it’s going to burst as the pink cloud passes and one's faced with the fact of the long trek ahead, made even more difficult by the solitariness of the journey.