We say a lot about ourselves in the way we navigate our digital lives.

If multiple people send you an instant message at once, whom do you reply to first? If someone tells you that they sent you an email, how quickly do you check it? If you're having a text conversation with someone, how many other windows do you have open while talking to them?

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When you look at your actions in this way, our relationships and what they mean to us suddenly become a lot clearer.

At least, that was certainly the case when the viewers spent an entire episode of Modern Family watching as Claire Dunphy navigated several crises using just her laptop. Her online conversations with her family and friends were suddenly there for us to scrutinize.

Framing an entire episode through the lens of one character's computer screen was almost uncomfortably personal. (The episode was also shot using iPhones and iPads.) We learned a lot about Claire and about how her mind works, in ways that the usual plots couldn't possibly convey.

It was classic "show, don't tell." And this episode, titled "Connection Lost," showed us everything about Claire, from how her mom-first mind works when she sees an article about the fire dangers of dryer vents, to her endless to-do lists.

FaceTime with the fam. Image: ABC

In addition to the pure fun of the laptop-only framing device, it was used incredibly cleverly.

An example: The episode began with Claire — who we knew was the user of said computer because of her MacBook's name — clicking the right-hand corner of her computer screen and logging into a network titled "O'Hare Int'l Airport WiFi." Less than 10 seconds into the episode, we knew she was away from home, traveling, not part of her airline's VIP club, and probably stressed.

There was a great deal of information communicated in basically no time at all, and this stayed true through the entire half-hour.

Bonus points to the writers for the great attention to detail. Almost everything about Claire's digital world seemed fleshed out, down to the previous communications with her children. If you looked at the history of Claire's text messages to Haley, there was one where she had simply written "chicken and something," which we can assume was in reply to a query about dinner. I love that stuff.

In all, viewers were given a lot of credit in this half-hour, as the writers assumed we could piece together certain things from Claire's actions, and that was refreshing in a time when some shows feel the need to do a lot of hand-holding. But making leaps of logic actually made the episode great fun.

In adding this element, though, the show didn't lose its core purpose: to tell a family story.

In this case, the episode followed Claire attempting to reconcile with Haley after a fight but having trouble doing so since her daughter was out of communication. This lack of response led Claire on a wild fact-finding mission that at one point had her worried Haley had run off and gotten married in Las Vegas. (She hadn't.)

The all-screens episode ended with Haley revealing she'd simply been asleep and that she had left her phone in a car that ended up in Las Vegas, which is a conclusion that's in itself a commentary on our screen-prevalent lives. Sometimes you need to put them down and simply look around to find the answers you seek.