So, a few days into the crisis I rolled my sisters into a whatsapp group. At the time it was just that I felt I had to do something to keep them safe. But then something curious started to happen. Conversational pictures of each other's gardens slid into the chat almost immediately. Then one of my friends encouraged me to do a little garden tour on Facebook Stories. I started to notice other people doing the same. Everywhere, people's gardens in little squares or rectangles, windows into their green spaces. Gardens were linking up via light chains of data, green spaces flowing together. Whose tulips were those? Were they mine or someone else's? Were they everyone's now?
Each medium has its own nature and quality. The supereightish muzz of my Fire Tablet trying to run Zoom, or my old laptop lurching through Jitsi. The slightly smoothed views of the conferencing apps on the modern phones and fancy desktops, where everything is lightly, slight enhanced. The muted colours of Google Hangouts, the primped and simplified brassy brights of FB stories , the tweaked tones and subtly matched palettes of Instagram videos.
It's not the reality of other people's gardens. There's no scent, and what sound you can hear comes from small speakers, tiny microphones. A garden at the bottom of a long dark digital well. But right now, I'll take that.
Each medium has its own nature and quality. The supereightish muzz of my Fire Tablet trying to run Zoom, or my old laptop lurching through Jitsi. The slightly smoothed views of the conferencing apps on the modern phones and fancy desktops, where everything is lightly, slight enhanced. The muted colours of Google Hangouts, the primped and simplified brassy brights of FB stories , the tweaked tones and subtly matched palettes of Instagram videos.
It's not the reality of other people's gardens. There's no scent, and what sound you can hear comes from small speakers, tiny microphones. A garden at the bottom of a long dark digital well. But right now, I'll take that.
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