I Miss Being Human

There are multiple theories on what makes us human. It has been pondered by philosophers from Socrates to Plato over the years. It has been studied by scientists from many different fields from biology to paleoanthropology. The simple act of even contemplating what makes us human, indeed makes us human.

Do you know within all those studies, 11 factors stand out as key factors that separate us from animals?

1. The Larynx (the Voice Box)
2. The Shoulder
3. The Hands and Opposable Thumbs
4. Naked, Hairless Skin
5. Standing Upright and Bipedalism
6. Blushing Response
7. The Human Brain
8. The Mind: Imagination, Creativity and Forethought
9. Religion and Awareness of Death
10. Storytelling/Episodic Memory
11. Biochemical Factors

Why is this so important to understand during the Coronavirus pandemic? Because the angst that we feel, the depression, the fight in many of us to return to “normal” isn’t rebellion.

It is us … collectively … missing being human, mourning being human, longing to be human again.

1. I miss sitting and talking with someone close, maskless, guiltless — laughing from my belly with all my breathe, with no concern I am harming anyone by doing so or risking my own life.
2. I miss using my shoulders to lift my arms in an impromptu hug to an old friend I have run into at the grocery store.
3. I miss the handshake at the beginning of a business meeting — that immediate read you get on someone on how limp or firm they take your hand, how their eyes meet yours in that moment.
4. I miss the touch of brushing up against someone while wading though a crowded restaurant fearlessly.
5. I miss standing in line at a movie theater to get tickets — the smell of the popcorn, the racing to the back to get the best seats without anyone next to me; not because their closeness scares me, but because I can’t stand hearing strangers chew.
6. I miss turning jokes dirty and making myself blush at the office and my co-worker teasing me for turning my own face red.
7. I miss being stuck behind that same school bus on the way to work every day when the same little kid would be late for school, every, single, day and would come running out all flustered and cute. I’d sit and wait and remember back to when my boys were that young and cute dragging backpacks to school that were heavier than they were.
8. I miss going to a crowded concert to listen to live music; feeling the bass in my chest, a lyric moving me, the energy of the crowd bringing the music to life.
9. I miss being invited to endless weddings and baby christenings and sitting in a packed church with tears in my eyes about the fresh beginning of new lives and families — touching hands with strangers, “peace be with you“.
10. I miss meeting with friends to tell a loud, animated story about the 20 different crazy things that had happened to me since the last time we met up. And, having them return the stories and have us all giggle and interrupt, talk over one another.
11. I miss being human to my core, deep into the genetic portions of me, to all of us, that are wired so differently than animals that it makes me aware of how much I miss the first ten factors.

So, as we sit … after almost a year … isolated to supposedly stay alive … to “save” humanity … perhaps we at least honor that in that attempt we lessen all the things that make us human. This won’t be our new normal, because it can’t be our normal. Or, we erase the very things in us all that make us human. You are asking us to devolve … to live. And, that isn’t a choice many of us will find tolerable to make.

Nor, should it ever be.

We miss being human, and we should … because in that longing lives humanity.