Empathic Intimacies: A Touch That You Can Really Feellllll is two essays written 2 years apart (April 2020 and April 2022 published together to create a timeline between two points in this ongoing pandemic.

This 2nd version, written two years after the first draft, speaks to the insurmountable time that has passed during this crisis. Since April 2020 many people have been able to touch again, to be intimate with others to seemingly resume life again, for many like picking back up after a long trip away from home. Many have chosen to race back into the world without giving themselves the time and space necessary for fully dealing with the weight of this crisis. I think of those who can’t return to life as it was before due to the inaction of our governments during this crisis, of the millions and millions who have not had access to not even one vaccine dose (when many in the United States have had three). I think of the immunocompromised who may not be able to fully return to the world as we knew it due to variant after variant still plaguing the globe. I think of those (like myself) whose mental health has deteriorated and whose agoraphobia accompanies and abets this forced isolation. For many of us, we have always sought the alternative forms of intimacy that can be found in the pages of a book.