Julio

“I almost fell in love with someone — over Zoom DM!” says Julio Escarce.

Julio, who uses they/them pronouns, moved to Portland right before the pandemic began, looking for a new start.

“I’ve always been a person who knows like 100 people,” says Julio. But they didn’t know 100 people. They didn’t even know one.

The pandemic shut down all social connections. Because of COVID, no one was going out, making friends, or dating. A few dead-end jobs didn’t yield social connections. A year later, at the end of the first pandemic winter, Julio didn’t know anyone in Portland outside their roommates.

In the spring of 2021, Julio took a remote humanities class with Andrew Cohen, a PCC instructor. While many PCC instructors didn’t press students to turn on their cameras during Zoom, Cohen strongly encouraged camera use. For Julio, that policy changed everything.

Julio was energized by the faces onscreen. They channeled their energy into connecting with classmates through direct messaging.

“I’ll go in and every single person that has a cool outfit on, or has a dog, I’ll be like: hey, good morning! I like your outfit! I like your coffee mug! I like your dog! That's an interesting photograph you have on the wall!” says Julio. “Then I would get into these hours-long discussions that would extend…We would jump on another video call after class was over.”

The classroom felt like a real community, Julio says, and even led to a romance with a classmate.

When the class ended, Julio flew to Colorado to visit the paramour (they admit: “I’m an all-in kind of person”). While it didn’t work out, Julio says the spark was only possible through the weird immediacy of a Zoom chat.

In 2022, Julio came back to campus for in-person classes. Paradoxically, they say that sitting in a classroom offers less connection than Zoom. Because of mask requirements, they don’t really know what people’s faces look like. People come to class, study, and leave immediately after. Julio, on the other hand, slow-packs their bag, chatting with the instructor.

Despite the awkwardness of masks, Julio knows that those glory days of remote learning were not a replacement for real community. “Zoom DM only goes so far,” they admit. While the chat bridges gaps, it lacks the flexibility and intimacy of just walking down the hall with someone after class.

“Like you know when you meet with a teacher and then you're walking out and then you lean on the door and are like, Just one more thing? On Zoom, once you leave the call, there is no one more thing,” Julio admits. “All the special stuff happens in the in-between spaces.”