I’m in Florida, my kids are in Germany. Now we’re a family in virtual reality.
I must have stared at the box for at least ten minutes with a mixture of anxiety, anticipation, excitement, and maybe a tiny drop of fear. Then I felt silly. After all, I’m the one who bought this thing, and I bought two identical boxes for my sons. How hard could it be?
These are the thoughts of a 46-year-old single mother in a wheelchair who is separated from her children by thousands of miles, and now finds herself staring at an unopened virtual reality headset package.
This all started, like many of my recent life adventures, on the Clubhouse app. As usual, I was in a room filled with fellow voice actors, but there was a newcomer who had worked as a developer of the Oculus Quest 2, and he was sharing all the details. I’m pretty good with tech devices, but mostly when they’re useful for photos and videos — specifically to promote my solo wheelchair travels. I know virtual reality headsets have been around for a long time, but why would I need one? I just never thought I would be remotely interested in using one since I’m not a gamer.
Then Dan the VR Guy, as I like to call him now, cast the line. He told all of us in this Clubhouse room about a young man in the US whose ailing grandmother was living far away in Germany, and he couldn’t visit her because of COVID travel restrictions. So, he bought an Oculus virtual reality (VR) headset for himself and for his 93 year-old grandmother. Now, he and his grandmother could take virtual walks through villages in Europe where she grew up, and just sit and have conversations together in a virtual space.
I was floored by this story in a way many people can’t imagine. I’m divorced, and my two sons live with their military father during school year. In September 2020, he was assigned to a military base in Germany, so our children moved there with him. Before COVID, my plan was to spend as much time in Europe with my boys as possible. However, due to COVID travel restrictions, I haven’t seen them outside of a cell phone screen in seven months. This is the longest I’ve ever been away from them, and it’s excruciating.
Enter the Oculus.
After Dan the VR Guy told us this story, I started peppering him with a million questions (as did at least a dozen other people in the room). How much do they cost? ($299 for the 64 gigabyte version.) How can I get it to Germany? (Amazon sells it and ships to military bases overdseas.) How do we link up in a private room? (Big Screen is a great place to start.) What can the three of us do together in a virtual space? (Watch movies, see the world, and play games!) Without trying that hard (he doesn’t make a commission on Oculus sales; he just really loves the product), he reeled me and several others in, hook, line, and sinker. I bought three headsets on the spot.
As a wheelchair user who can’t really use my right hand very well, I was admittedly concerned about how much utility I would get out of the Oculus. Fortunately, there’s a setting for users who want to sit down, or for people like me, who have no other choice but to sit down. I just make sure I give myself enough space so I can swivel my wheelchair to the left or to the right to see around me. It is tricky switching back and forth between the controllers because there are certain buttons that I have to use with the right one, and it’s very hard for me to push buttons or squeeze triggers with my right hand. However, with some practice and patience, I’m making it work.
The next step was to get my boys set up with their headsets. I will admit, I really wasn’t too concerned about this. Kids are so much smarter about modern technology than adults are, and they definitely figured everything out right away with a little bit of administrative help from their dad. He and I both made sure they got their accounts squared away, the Oculus app set up on cell phones, and their introductory walk-through completed.
But today was a really big day. It was already exciting just to hear them through my headset in what Oculus calls a private party. However, in an app called Big Screen, I was able to create a private invite-only room and have my boys virtually join me. I can’t tell you how much joy I felt when I saw their quirky little avatars waving at me from what felt like only a few feet away! We took a few minutes to look at each other and see what fun choices we made for our avatars, saw the little stars flying everywhere when we high-fived, and laughed at all the little sparkles when we shook hands.
As I tried to get some technical stuff figured out for the room, my boys simply started doing what they would normally do if that room were real — just wandering around, exploring, yelling at each other to come look at this, and telling me to come closer so they could show me something. We were laughing, talking excitedly, and sharing lots of OOOOOH!s and AHHHHH!s over how incredible our VR living quarters were. Being mindful not to keep them in VR for too long to both prevent headaches and addiction, our time together was up too soon.
But just those precious minutes together in that virtual room have me so excited for the possibilities! I know that we can watch 3-D movies and TV together, and even play some games in that private Big Screen room. With an app called Wander, we can go anywhere in the world and use what is essentially a 360° version of immersive Google Maps to learn about places we want to go, or revisit places we’ve already been. And I’m really excited to download apps for miniature golf, fishing, and even table tennis.
It really is a lot to absorb, but they’re going to be in Germany for just over two more years. We have time to learn. I’m really glad I made the investment in virtual reality headsets, even though they seemed so intimidating at first. I’m anxious for COVID travel restrictions between the United States and Europe to be lifted, but in the meantime, I don’t have time to waste when it comes to being with my sons — even if it’s only in a virtual world.
