Thread 2: The looking started before they got to us
The cravings (discussed in Thread 1) aren't new, but having to choose where they get met is new.
Ordinary life used to provide most of what people now buy a ticket to feel. You didn't need to pick your village, you were just in it. Sat around a table you didn't choose. On a street that knew your name without asking. Work that still knew you. Connection, recognition, grounding, a sense that what you did counted... these weren't products. They were the weather of life.
That weather changed.