Last week I was sitting on the couch next to my mum, watching TV. We were drinking tea, she had a biscuit. Both our mugs were on the coffee table. Her elbow lightly brushed against mine, and she apologised. I sat in amazement, that she had apologised for something so free of malice or consequence. I was wondering why she would do that, and then I realised something: people are afraid of touching each other. Once I began actively thinking about it, it all became so obvious that I couldn't believe it hadn't occurred to me before. After that, everywhere I went I would watch people, and so rarely they touched. A handshake, a pat on the shoulder, a hug that you'd miss if you blinked.
I like to watch people's hands as they do everyday things, it's amazing how fast and precise the hands are, beautiful in their own way. I was watching my sister's hands, and I wondered what they felt like. I can't remember ever touching my sister's hands, or anyone else's for that matter. The hands seem like an accessable part of another person, the easiest part to touch, but we don't. When someone passes something to you and your hands touch briefly, they'll very often recoil as though they've touched something hot.
I can't understand this odd social convention. I can see how it would generate a positive-feedback effect, though; the less we touch the more we become afraid of it. I see that small children aren't averse to touching, so it's obviously not an instinctive or evolutionary phenomenon. Perhaps it's something that's confined to my immediate social surroundings, I don't know. Whatever the reason, I think it's just sad. We drift about, always protecting our own space so fiercely that we isolate ourselves from the people closest to us.