You don’t notice connective tissue when it’s healthy.
You notice bones.
You notice muscle.
You notice the visual parts.
Tissue just holds everything together quietly.
For decades, this country had connective tissue so thick you didn’t even question it.
You could disagree with someone and still feel like you were standing on the same floor.
You could argue politics and still eat at the same table.
You could root for different teams and still meet at the same bar.
There was density.
Density of contact.
Density of familiarity.
Density of shared reference.
The diner had the same waitress.
The hardware store had the same man behind the counter.
The church had the same folding chairs.
The bar had the same three guys on the same three stools.
It wasn’t glamorous.
It was glue.
Then something changed.
Not overnight.
Not explosively.
Gradually.
Stores closed.
Venues rotated owners.
Churches shrank.
Jobs went remote.
Kids moved away.
Phones replaced sidewalks.
Algorithms replaced town squares.
We stopped bumping into each other.
We started scheduling each other.
We stopped overhearing conversations.
We started curating them.
It doesn’t feel like collapse.
It feels like thinning.
That’s why it feels like the pandemic all over again without the mask.
No mandates.
No shutdowns.
But the air feels lighter.
Less crowded.
Less braided.
Men don’t gather like they used to.
Women feel unseen in ways they can’t quite articulate.
Friendships drift not because of anger — but because of inertia.
The watering hole is gone.
The union hall is quiet.
The local paper is thinner.
The neighborhood is quieter after dark.
When density drops, belonging drops.
When belonging drops, trust strains.
And when trust strains, reality feels negotiable.
You don’t feel outraged first.
You feel unmoored.
Like something steady is missing but you can’t point to a single villain.
That’s the hard part.
This isn’t about one party.
Or one leader.
Or one generation.
It’s about erosion of shared texture.
We used to assume we were experiencing the same world.
Now two neighbors can watch the same event and walk away with entirely different realities.
That fractures tissue.
You don’t need agreement to have cohesion.
You need shared exposure.
Shared places.
Shared rituals.
Shared friction.
Without those, society becomes parallel lines.
Functional.
But separate.
And separation feels cold.
So what do you do when the tissue thins?
You don’t declare war.
You rebuild density.
You bring back the table.
You host the cookout.
You join the league.
You show up to the school board even if it’s boring.
You sit in the bleachers.
You call the friend you haven’t seen.
You reoccupy physical space.
You create small anchors.
Because connective tissue doesn’t regenerate at scale first.
It regenerates locally.
In rooms.
In driveways.
In garages.
In church basements.
In corner diners.
It grows where repetition happens.
Where faces become familiar again.
Where disagreement doesn’t mean exile.
Normal isn’t gone.
It’s underfed.
And the people who remember thick tissue are the ones who can feed it.
Not through speeches.
Not through viral posts.
Through habit.
Through consistency.
Through presence.
You can’t force national cohesion.
But you can thicken the square footage around you.
That’s not small.
That’s how every durable culture survives turbulence.
Quietly.
Not dramatically.
If it feels thin, that means you remember when it wasn’t.
That memory is not nostalgia.
It’s blueprint.
Start there.
Find the place.
Or build one.
And invite someone back into the room.
That’s how tissue holds again.
Not all at once.
But enough to move without tearing.
Mailbox – Intelligent People Assume Nothing
The Faust Baseline Explained – Intelligent People Assume Nothing
Unauthorized commercial use prohibited.
© 2026 The Faust Baseline LLC
