“Nothing makes the earth seem so spacious as to have friends at a distance; they make the latitudes and longitudes.”
– Henry Thoreau, Walden

In the academic psychology world, there are two particularly famous, large-scale studies of health and happiness – the Terman Study and the Grant Study, each of which followed cohorts throughout almost the entirety of their lives. And both, in the end, reached similar conclusions: your relationships, and the people in your life, are indeed what matter most. But not just from a happiness perspective; even in terms of longevity, the Terman study observed “connecting with and helping others is more important than obsessing over a rigorous exercise program,” and the Grant study discovered the single best predictor of whether someone would still be alive and thriving at 80 was whether there was currently “someone they would feel comfortable phoning at four in the morning to tell their troubles to.”

Yet modern life – and particularly modern, urban life – seems to transpire against maintaining connections. In the two decades since graduating college, my friends have spread across the country, started families, dived deep into demanding jobs. All of which has made it far more difficult to stay close, especially when my own life and schedule are just as densely packed.

Still, whether in friendships, or for work (where the old ‘it’s who you know’ adage applies as much as ever), trying to maintain those relationships nonetheless has long been important to me. So, as with many other areas of my life, I’ve depended on technology for an assist. For years, I used the CRM system Contactually; since it pivoted towards the real estate world (eventually being acquired by mega-brokerage Compass), I switched to the similar Cloze instead.

The idea of Cloze is simple: you bucket your contacts into groups (whether friends and family or loose connections, customers or vendors, etc.), and then set a frequency with which you’d like to stay in touch with members of that group. Cloze watches your emails and calendar and text messages and calls, and automatically maintains a timeline of your interactions with each contact. And, if the time since the last exchange drifts beyond the interval that you’ve set, Cloze automatically reminds you to reach out.

In normal times, I spend a few minutes each day pinging the people Cloze flags, and I’ve done my best to keep that up despite the lockdown, with emails or texts or calls to a cousin in LA, a former colleague in Tel Aviv, an old friend down in Miami Beach, and dozens of others. Mostly, I’ve just sent best wishes and healthy vibes, my hopes that they’re staying safe and sane through this all. And, in return, I’ve gotten updates on how each is navigating these crazy times, along with kind words and well-wishes in return.

Especially here in NYC, where we’re deep into full terrarium, it’s been excellent to remember how far the world – and my ties to it – extends beyond these walls; to be reminded how lucky I am to have those friends and family, even at a distance. They make the latitudes and longitudes, indeed.