Parallel play is wonderful and you should do it. Pretty much every day nowadays, [[The Sailers]] show up on a Discord call and just do stuff. Sometimes that's playing a game together, sometimes it's playing stuff separately, or watching something, or just existing in the same space. The voice channel has become its own coffee shop with people filtering in and out. I can't remember the last time *someone* hasn't been on a call, even if it's just one or two people for an hour or so. [[FFXIV Unlocked My CM Powers|This parallel play started with FFXIV]], but it's evolved far past that - for the better. I have some great friends that I see in person, but it's hard to do that consistently. And I'm never going to go to a bar or something like that. My friends are scattered across the four winds[^1] too. But they don't feel that far away when we can hang out in the evenings. It gives me the social energy I desperately need and don't get from remote work. And that's not just because I'm working alone in my room. It's because I do not connect with my coworkers, like...at all. We are entirely different types of people with entirely different lifestyles and senses of humor and interests. I am the odd one out at work, so I don't say much on calls. But during our hangouts I'm amongst my people. If you're not hanging out with your friends because you feel like it has to be a specific "event," I implore you to rethink this. Just exist in the same space as them. Even when you can't see their faces, sharing in their presence is great and fun and healthy. Or at least I hope so, because that's how it feels for me! [^1]: with a surprising amount of that wind being in Georgia LMFAO