Modern life is lonely. We all need someone to help | Deborah Orr

You can feel it on the bus, in school, at the shops: the threat of isolation, hardwired into our livesHopping on the bus home on Wednesday night, I was greeted by the sight of a young woman hunched over her phone, alone in a seat, bawling for England. Or, as it turned out, Scotland. As I plonked myself down beside her and asked her what was wrong, various slumped passengers burst into animation as if a switch had been thrown, and started beseeching me to tell her that she must stay on this bus u