Early in the 20th century, settlers poured into Saskatchewan from around the world, lured by the promise of free land that would enable even the poorest to own their own farm. Life wasn’t as easy as portrayed by the government advertising, but most people stuck it out through hardships, harsh weather and unexpected setbacks. Despite long hours of heavy labour, those pioneer families found time to visit each other, celebrate together, worship together and help each other in times of distress.

Lately, I’ve been wondering if that connectedness didn’t contribute as much to their success as their hard work. Dr. Jody Carrington, a psychologist from Olds, Alberta, spoke in Moose Jaw recently (as reported in Moose Jaw Today), and said the human brain is wired for connection. Many of our problems today are caused by the fact that we live in a disconnected world.

My first thought on reading that was why do we need a psychologist to tell us what we already know within ourselves to be true? But Dr. Carrington came armed with facts and figures. Some of the figures she cited are that 50% of young adults feel that no one shows then genuine care; lonely employees have 45% lower productivity, 12% lower quality of work and twice as many days missed at work. Straight white males, supposedly the most privileged group, account for 75% of suicides. She says that more people are dying from emotional illness than from physical illness. My second thought that we do need a psychologist to show us that the problem is real, not just something that we imagine

With that knowledge, we can do something about the problem. We need real, live, personal connections, not merely social media connections. Cultivating friendships will help to overcome fear and anxiety. We would probably be better off if we ignored many of the distractions from our electronic devices.

As I was meditating on these things a couple of interesting things happened. The first was an email from a lady in Alberta who said her husband had a little personal connection to a historical topic that I have been researching. Then she said, I think you are a cousin to my mother. And I am! I hardly knew her mother, but had more contact with her aunt and her grandmother.

The next day we went to Moose Jaw to visit my cousin and my wife’s sister. There is a lady in Moose Jaw who writes a blog that I follow and the thought came to me to ask if we could meet her and her husband for coffee while we were in Moose Jaw. And so we met at Tim’s for coffee, two couples who had never seen each other before. In the course of visiting we were shocked to discover that this lady and I were related. After returning home we each checked genealogical records and found that our mothers were second cousins.

Could it be that the world is full of strangers only because we haven’t taken the time to stop and talk to them?