Everything happens everywhere now. At the first hybrid outdoor service at my Unitarian church, what started as motion on the screen is a still shot. It’s a sweet one, of kids in lawn chairs surrounded by fallen leaves. Then the minister steps in and raises his arms, where they stay for the next ten minutes. It’s Day of the Dead, and in physical space, children and grownups build a rambling altar for the ones who have passed, adding photos, crumpled envelopes and porcelain birds. In the service held in air, we type in names. 

They scroll in the chat—someone’s tia, someone’s son and daughter, a lot of parents and grandparents. A dear friend Joe. The ritual continues with winding music, flickering in and out through my computer speaker. I lean in close, almost tipping my coffee. It’s like listening to a message from the moon, when the early astronauts called back to earth. 

There are words of comfort, then the final hymn. I cannot think of them as dead who walk with me no more. . . I raise my voice and we all do, singing next to each other, blocks apart, thousands of miles, and from the afterlife. Grandma Lavurn, God rest her soul, hums along in her scratchy alto. It’s all static but the ether crackles. Everyone’s calling in.