People are so amazing. I like people watching, because I like to try to figure out what is being said between friends, what this or that person is doing on their blackberry, or what he or she thinks about that book. It's like being a detective. More than that, I like to imagine what it would be like if I WERE that person - what would be the worry in the forefront of my mind? what small problems would I be stressing about? What kind of place would I return home to when I've finished my daily obligations? What kind of person would I be if I had not been born to my own parents, raised in my town, and experienced life thus far with my friends? Would my ideas about life be the same? not likely.
Human connection is of the utmost importance. Why are we here, if not to love and learn from one another? All we are is a bunch of lost souls, wandering around, bumping into each other, trying to make sense of it all. What we have somehow forgotten is that WE ARE ALL SOULS. Cut from the same fabric. Single drops of water from the same ocean. Whatever you're looking for at any given moment can be found, usually in people. What a gift God has given us in the reassurance of a like minded friend. It can be the tipping point for a life-changing decision, or just the pat on the back and the affirmation that the sky is, in fact blue.
a'ight. Time to bump into people (and dogs) at runyon. PEACE be with you. (and also with you.)
That's funny; my mind sometimes goes to the same place. It normally happens while I'm flying somewhere, especially at night. As my plane soars over a city, I can see the gleam of hundreds of lights, like stars in the sky, and I wonder what the people inside the homes or buildings those lights are emanating from are doing as I hover over them for that brief second or so? Is there a family watching TV? Is a couple making love? Are friends fighting? Am I flying over the home of the
ReplyDeletenext Jimi Hendrix as he practices in his garage? Is someone getting hurt as I sit comfortably and helplessly in my chair 30,000 feet over them? Is a child being born? Is my soul mate who I am destined to meet one day in a grocery store, museum or bus stop directly underneath me at this moment? Is the guy behind me thinking the same thing as he stares out of his airplane window?
It however makes me think of a sort of antithesis to your statement of humans connecting. My in-flight
daydreaming makes me realize that there are so many lives that we don’t and won’t ever connect with in
our lifetimes. No matter how like-minded we could be with another soul that roams this earth,
another soul that may have all the answers to our questions, we will never get to meet them. Life is
crazy I guess.
Your statement about us being cut from the same fabric, drops from the same ocean is pretty accurate.
Almost 7 years ago I was sitting in a hotel room waiting for my date to come by so that we could go to
dinner. She was running pretty late, so I called to make sure everything was ok. She told me she was
upset because her hair wasn’t doing what she wanted it to, she had a blemish or two she was trying to
cover up so she was debating not coming. I reassured her that those things didn’t matter to me, and she
was beautiful regardless of what direction her hair was going in. So after I hung up, I was inspired to write her a poem, the only poem I have ever written, to try and put her at ease about those superficial things in the future. A year ago I was reading an autobiography, and the author wrote a story about a night, about 25 years ago, when he and his wife at the time were getting ready to go to a dinner party. As he sat waiting, she was running late because she was also having issues with what to wear and her appearance. So as he waited, he grabbed a napkin and penned a song for her to express that it didn’t matter to him what she wore because she was beautiful to him bar none. The author was Eric Clapton and the song was one if his most successful songs, "Wonderful tonight". Although my poem was in no way a "Wonderful tonight", I think these are two very similar instances that add credence to your statement and although decades apart, were two needed affirmations that the sky is, in fact, blue...
People watching has become kinda my hobby nowadays when I go out, usually at the mall. And I do the same thing, actually. Like, think what I would do if I were in their shoes. Quite fascinating where my mind goes, actually lol.
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