>• “Low‑effort chat outlet”: I had one friend I could message stupid little updates to (“made a decent omelette”, “fixed the sink”). We didn’t have deep talks every day, but just having a place to put those small moments kept me from feeling like my life was happening in a vacuum.

I ran a media-centric chatroom at one time filled with folks that would drop in and tell me about their omelettes, and then over the course of some time, wars, struggles, disease, etc they all disappeared.

This is a bit other-sided, but while I was happy to provide the environment they needed to offload silly stuff (and they, too, were struggling) I never anticipated how much I would miss the small daily comments once they were gone.

If you have that kind of connection with folks, regardless of how silly, cherish it. They will probably end up feeling similarly in the long run.