ALONE, CONFINED to a limited space, eating the contents of foil packages, interacting with loved ones through jittery, pixelating screens, “signing off” to say goodbye. Like countless other people under quarantine globally, I’m restrained within the same walls I’ve taken for granted all these years—I probably should have spent more time decorating.

The Covid-19 crisis has forced us to fundamentally shift how we operate and interact as humans in just a short window. But what first seemed like a lonely dystopia has, for many,...