We don’t talk anymore.
I blame the anti-smoking campaigns.
A much-maligned aspect of modern society is the lack of casual conversation we have with semi-strangers. People outside of bars, smoking. People outside of work, smoking. People outside of our apartment buildings, smoking. See a trend here?
As smoking has gone out of vogue in the United States, we’ve stopped talking to each other. Without the pillar of big tobacco keeping us all united via small talk, society is breaking apart.
Thankfully, our dogs are taking dumps.
While we may not bond anymore over bummed cigarettes, there’s something comforting about seeing the same (and a few new) faces when I take my pup down the elevator and across the street every afternoon to relieve herself in the unattended open field. Of course, she won’t poop with those other people around. Fargo’s very particular about her poops, and greeting fellow mammals comes before anything else (including her own physical needs), but you get the point. Thanks to our dogs’ processing of their own waste, we still can drop a casual hello to a familiar face without a name. Or that one guy who still smokes outside the building. The dude with the Dodgers hat. Hope he’s ok. Has he considered getting a dog?
