The more we elaborate our means of communication, the less we

Host:
The rain slicked streets of the city glowed under the ghost light of neon — red, blue, and that lonely shade of yellow that only seems to appear when the world is tired of talking. Taxi horns blared, but even they sounded mechanical now, as if emotion had been outsourced to technology.

Inside a small 24-hour diner, the world slowed. The clock above the counter ticked without conviction, and the faint hum of a refrigerator blended with the sighs of strangers scrolling through glowing screens. The place smelled like burnt coffee, wet coats, and unspoken thoughts.

Jack sat in the back booth, his phone face down on the table, hands wrapped around a cup that had long since gone cold. Across from him, Jeeny stirred her tea with quiet precision, the spoon tapping the cup like the tick of an impatient clock.

Jeeny: “J. B. Priestley once said — ‘The more we elaborate our means of communication, the less we communicate.’”
Jack: “He said that before smartphones. Imagine what he’d write now.”
Jeeny: “Probably nothing. He’d tweet half a sentence, get misquoted, and give up.”
Jack: “So, he’d become one of us.”
Jeeny: [smiles] “Exactly. Drowning in words, starving for meaning.”
Jack: “It’s strange. We’ve built the most advanced communication tools in history, and all we’ve managed to do is become lonelier.”
Jeeny: “Because we stopped speaking to be understood. We speak to be seen.”

Host:
A neon sign flickered in the window — “OPEN ALL NIGHT” — though the irony wasn’t lost on either of them. The world might have been awake, but nobody was really there.

Jack: “You ever notice how silence used to be comfortable? Now it feels like failure.”
Jeeny: “Because we filled it with noise. Messages. Notifications. Validation on tap.”
Jack: “Yeah. It’s like we’ve mistaken visibility for connection.”
Jeeny: “Exactly. We don’t talk to know each other anymore. We talk to avoid ourselves.”
Jack: “You think it’s reversible? This whole digital decay?”
Jeeny: “Only if we start treating conversation like art again — something fragile and slow.”

Host:
The waitress passed by, setting down two fresh cups. The steam curled upward, thin and tender, vanishing before it could be captured — much like the attention span of the world outside.

Jack: “You know, I remember when phone calls meant something. You had to dial patience. You had to wait for someone to answer.”
Jeeny: “And now?”
Jack: “Now we expect instant intimacy. One emoji and we think we’ve confessed our soul.”
Jeeny: “Or one read receipt and we think we’ve been abandoned.”
Jack: “So, the technology got faster, but the feelings didn’t.”
Jeeny: “No — the feelings got outsourced. Now we automate what used to ache.”
Jack: “And you call that progress.”
Jeeny: “No. I call it theater.”

Host:
The diner door creaked open, letting in a gust of cold air — and with it, the sound of distant voices laughing into phones, performing connection for invisible audiences. The door shut, and the quiet rushed back like relief.

Jeeny: “You know what Priestley understood? That communication isn’t about information. It’s about presence.”
Jack: “Presence. That’s the one thing we’ve killed.”
Jeeny: “We’ve traded it for projection. We send out little digital versions of ourselves and wonder why no one really knows us.”
Jack: “You think anyone still wants to?”
Jeeny: “Of course. But we’re out of practice. We don’t know how to sit in truth anymore.”
Jack: “Or silence.”
Jeeny: “Especially silence. It terrifies people.”

Host:
The rain tapped harder against the window, as if trying to remind them that real sound still existed — unfiltered, unshared, unsaved. Jack traced his finger along the edge of his coffee cup, his reflection rippling in the dark liquid.

Jack: “Funny, isn’t it? We built the internet to bring people together — and ended up building walls we can scroll.”
Jeeny: “Walls made of updates and filters.”
Jack: “You sound nostalgic.”
Jeeny: “Not nostalgic. Just… human. I miss tone. I miss pauses. I miss watching someone’s eyes while they lie.”
Jack: [smirking] “So you miss theater too.”
Jeeny: “No — I miss honesty that could still be seen.”
Jack: “And now it’s all typed, timestamped, and erased.”
Jeeny: “Exactly. We turned confession into content.”

Host:
The jukebox clicked on, an old song crackling to life — something from the 1950s, full of brass and longing. It filled the diner softly, like a ghost reminding them that music used to be something you felt, not just streamed.

Jack: “Maybe that’s what Priestley meant by ‘elaborate means.’ We’ve overdesigned communication — polished it until it lost its fingerprints.”
Jeeny: “We turned expression into interface. Feelings into functions. Language into marketing.”
Jack: “We used to talk to change each other. Now we talk to maintain illusion.”
Jeeny: “And we call that freedom.”
Jack: “When really it’s fatigue.”
Jeeny: “A beautiful fatigue — all light, no warmth.”

Host:
Outside, a taxi splashed through a puddle, scattering the reflections of the diner lights. Inside, time seemed to slow again. The noise of the world — constant, invisible — stayed at bay, like waves breaking against glass.

Jack: “You think there’s any hope left? For conversation, I mean.”
Jeeny: “Of course. Hope lives in slowness. In people willing to stay in the same sentence.”
Jack: “That’s rare.”
Jeeny: “So is sincerity.”
Jack: “Then maybe the next revolution isn’t technological.”
Jeeny: “No. It’s emotional. Learning to listen again.”
Jack: “Without a reply button.”
Jeeny: “Without needing to be right.”

Host:
The clock ticked louder now, or maybe it was just that they’d stopped filling the air with words. The neon light flickered again, spelling “OPEN” for half a second before surrendering to dark.

Jack leaned back, finally smiling — a tired, honest kind of smile, like someone who’d found comfort in the simplicity of presence.

Jack: “You know something, Jeeny?”
Jeeny: “What?”
Jack: “Maybe communication was never about talking. Maybe it’s about endurance — staying long enough to matter.”
Jeeny: “Exactly. And the best conversations aren’t broadcast. They’re whispered.”
Jack: “Like this one.”
Jeeny: “Like this one.”

Host:
The rain eased, leaving the world outside freshly washed, though unchanged. Jeeny closed her eyes, listening to the last notes of the song fade, and for a moment, the silence didn’t feel empty — it felt earned.

And as the city resumed its endless dialogue of light and noise,
the truth of J. B. Priestley’s words lingered in the quiet corner of that diner —

that every new invention promising connection
has only multiplied the distance between souls.

That speech without listening
is architecture without purpose.

And that perhaps the most revolutionary act left
in a world of infinite communication
is simply to look, stay, and mean it —

to rediscover that the deepest form of language
is not what we send,
but what we hold in silence together.