Libby Sommer: ‘My Friend Is Swiping & Scrolling’

My Friend Is Swiping & Scrolling

My friend in the dark hour before dawn. My friend with the ragged stomach who had a bad night. In a different hemisphere he is turning on the bedside light, rolling out of bed, pouring a cap of antacid at the kitchen bench. My friend who hasn’t left his neighbourhood all year. My friend in London pining for how things used to be, for the Eurostar crossings to speak German and Spanish.

My friend scrolling through Facebook to see the faces of his family. My friend living alone who aches with aloneness. My friend the glass-half-full-kind-of-guy listening out for the early morning train thinking, we’ll get through this, in time. My friend who sits through forty Zoom meetings every five days. A rush of nostalgic reflections but is everything nostalgia? We’re all in this together.

The extroverted friend and the introverted one scrolling & swiping at home, the teenage friend whose father is hospitalised for a third time, my friend in China who…