Good morning. This is Spencer. I'm out for a walk and I've been thinking the last few days about

isolation and the toll that isolation takes on me and maybe on you as well recently was listening to a science podcast talking to I guess she's a psychologist the core of what she was talking

about was that we as humans are what are called gatorily gregarious, meaning that we need the company of others.

It's not optional that when we don't get it.

We can actually suffer not just emotionally but physically

with symptoms like high blood pressure,

but also depression, anxiety, and she mentioned hypervigilance, and I know a number of

you have written to me about being hypervigilant, and maybe the situation now is making that worse for you.

I don't know. But I thought about right now so many of us are under sort of enforced isolation. I have the company of a few people.

Live with my wife and we have a good relationship so that's a positive I have a

dog which also you know provides company provides at least some of that physical and

emotional support if not human company and we get to see our daughter about once a week, face to face.

One of the things that I'm realizing is that face to face is really important, but even with that support I don't have face-to-face interactions with any other people or very many other people at all. I mean there's the

distanced with a sheet of plexiglass interaction with the cash here at the

grocery store. It doesn't probably count although it's I think better than video interaction

There's a small group of neighbors who gather nightly to let our dogs play.

And you know I have a six foot leash,

so I figure if I'm at one end of the leash

and my dog is saying hi to somebody at the other end of the leash I'm six feet away right?

I'm walking through a neighborhood in its garbage collection day so you may hear

the occasional garbage truck going by. I'll try to keep that to a minimum on this recording.

Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah.

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