There has been a lot of recent writing about how something called “self-imposed loneliness” has overtaken American life since the pandemic. (See, for instance, this long-form from The Atlantic). I have had my own painful experience with this loneliness since the pandemic, as a lot of social outlets I had in my life utterly collapsed for various reasons and my social networks stopped functioning. Sometimes I am inclined in my frustration to yell “You are doing this to yourselves” but I don’t think the self-imposed description helps understand what has happened and I don’t blame anyone when I sit and think through it.

The Atlantic piece is good at providing a survey of the literature on the “loneliness epidemic,” updating Bowling Alone for the post-pandemic world with statistics and government reports. But, perhaps because the Atlantic has cast itself as the magazine of upper-middle-class anxiety, it continually asserts that we are “choosing” this solitude, rather than finding it imposed on us. Which is to say, it imagines a sphere of relative social and economic freedom of action in which individuals are finding the home more comforting. It bemoans this reality, desiring a recovery of social space, but it still thinks of it as a choice.

And, I don’t know, one major reason why I find myself at home more and out less is because of the affordability crisis. I used to be a coffee shop guy. I struggle to work and focus at home, and always enjoyed my “third place” office. But beyond the closure of a lot of coffee shops, the ones left are expensive. I went across the street to my local yesterday to try to break a slump, I got one cup of an admittedly indulgent Matcha Latte, and when I paid the bill, including service fees and tip, it was eight dollars. Had I just had a house drip coffee, it would have been around five or six dollars. That is not something I can do every day, given that over half my income goes to afford the bare minimum two-bedroom we need to house my five-year-old.

These costs are changing the nature of coffee shops because they are emptier during the week and people are spending less time in them—while they get busy on weekend brunch hours, when the people who actually make money swoop in with large circles of families for 20-dollar eggs. The events they host seem to be desperate for the widest possible audience. Geek Night Trivia was too esoteric I guess, now they do Pop Music Bingo. This doesn’t appeal to many adults, judging from how empty it looks when I walk by on those nights.

Maybe I’m just griping about losing my spot to my wage stagnation, but as the type of knowledge worker who used to fill coffee shops on weekdays, I don’t think I’m doing particularly poorly. Social life in a city requires a base of artists, service industry workers, and knowledge workers to create a cultural murmur of activity and interest that brings other people out, makes venues feel fun and dynamic, worth leaving the house for, and connects people to what others are doing culturally even if they are not personally culture makers. Losing that, as I think DC has, is not a personal choice, it’s structural. And social media like Meetup isn’t coming close to filling the gap left by having dynamic communal welcoming physical venues.

I barely ever see friends. Once a month maybe, at most. I’ve tried to invite people out but scheduling is difficult, and people tend to flake or just not respond, I have flaked on a few opportunities too out of depression or anxiety. I tried to fill it in with late nights at the local dive on occasion, but drinking isn’t good for me and that gets expensive too. I almost never see co-workers on campus anymore, all of our meetings and events have moved to Zoom. (Which, I think is in this case a choice by powers that be to keep us from building community and solidarity since we still have to teach in person). Once again, structural.

I’ve had the idea to start hosting movie nights every couple of weeks. If you are in the DC area and interested, let me know and I’ll send you the invite. I’m hopeful!

I don’t have any answers here, I know this absence isn’t how I want to live the rest of my life, but I don’t feel like we have chosen this solitude, so much as it has been imposed on us by a system that has decided anyone but the well-off gathering in spaces that aren’t church is dangerous to the status quo, and they’d much rather have us only talking on apps where we can be surveilled. That reads as paranoia, but I don’t quite know how to explain the complete collapse of public space, from indie movie theaters closing or only showing mainstream dreck, to every normal store (from CVS to Giant) being understaffed to such an extreme that shopping in person has become miserable and we are encouraged to do more and more of it online, coffee shops closing or pricing out their customers by refusing to offer simple cheap drip coffees, and even dive bars charging eight or nine dollars for a beer.

I’d love to hear more from others about how these last few years have been, I feel so much loss that I don’t know what to do with. I hope we can rebuild.