No, I Do Not Wish to Know You
strangers, surprises, and stardust
Last weekend, I read Carl Sagan’s words from his book, Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space, on Pinterest and cried a little bit inside.
He says, “Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it, everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every ‘superstar,’ every ‘supreme leader,’ every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there - on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.”
You see what I mean, right? Instant tearjerker.
Life is too fragile and the world is too busy for us to deeply connect with ‘every human being who ever was’. Sometimes I feel like we’re often forced to create relationships with people because that’s what we define as ‘being human’. To always seek companionship, intimate futures, and permanency in every single beautifully ephemeral attachment.
I question if this current notion of ‘being human’ requires us to only connect with others if it guarantees us time and space indefinitely to be with them. Time and space to nurture, invest in, or control. Where does that leave the others? The missed connections, the delicate exchanges, and the serendipitous lore?
A connection is a connection. How we measure it is relative to how much we value the unknown. If we value how long we’ve known someone, then we’ll feel safer to unravel ourselves slowly over time knowing we have enough of it. If we value meeting a stranger where they are, at that moment, without any preconceptions or expectations, then we’ll be more open to receiving a sweet (but sometimes bitter) little thing called surprise.
Isn’t it funny though? How every little surprise we find even in someone we’ve known for a long time can briefly make us feel like we’re strangers all over again? To feel surprised and estranged at the same time by someone we thought we knew, what a spectacle that is.
Anyway, to no one's surprise here, there is an infinite space inside of my heart for everyone I love. It’s because I’ve learned that cherishing moments with strangers makes the act of truly knowing someone all the more magical, more giving.
However, I’ve come to hold a special place for relationships that have entered and left in my life.
At the bottom of my heart, there is a room full of strangers. A jazzy, speakeasy of sorts filled with ex-best friends, old roommates, temporary lovers, or friends of friends of friends. Anyone that I connected with for even a minute in earnest is there, shimmering like stardust, floating around a dinner table like a constellation in the sky. And in that room, I’d like to believe we are all dancing, eating, sharing hot gossip, toasting, and mourning the human experiences we shared at one point, during that day or night, somewhere far away from here.
I’d like to imagine one day when I'm as old as can be, this room will be packed from corner to corner. I’d visit occasionally to reminisce with people from my past and share a few laughs. In doing so, I’ll forget I ever knew the feeling of loneliness.
Cheers to that.
˚ · • . ° .
The Humdrum:
[a list of life updates I can recall and string words together for]
Vienna by Billy Joel saved me. This was the first song I sang at my high school’s Coffeehouse. I’ve been singing it since, and not once did I think about the lyrics. I don’t think it was meant to find me until now. Here I am - twenty-five, living on my own, chasing too many dreams all at once, and wondering why I have crippling anxiety. Also, if you just replace Vienna with literally any other significant place or person in your life, you'll relate to it too. I promise. Sing it with me!
Coasters and a Robe. I was searching for Persian rug coasters and the perfect silky robe to wear at night and in the morning. I then realized if I could sit down, wear this robe, make my tea, place it on the coaster, and read a little something-something every single day for the rest of my life, I would.
A battle between ego and supplements. I denied my allergies the past few years the same way I denied my mini seasonal depressions. I’ve finally come to terms with both, and now my sword is forged by two tablets of Vitamin D and my shield resembles a generic brand of Zyrtec.
I should have paid more attention to M.I.A. Yes, the ‘live-fast-die-young-bad-girls-do-it-well artist made me feel seen as a young ‘wanna-be-different’ brown teenager growing up. But I don’t think I saw her and her music the way it was meant to be seen. I blame it on my age at the time and I think that is fair. This woman has been preaching about the military-industrial complex, censorship in the US, and how Western society sees immigrants through her albums, Kala and Matangi, for a decade. Now more than ever, we need more mainstream music to reflect the issues we see on a global scale.
A grief a penny could purchase. Whenever there is a palpable discomfort, a drop of injustice that the world collectively feels for people suffering, there is a small sign of humanity. Even though we live in this digital age, you cannot define humanity by finding the single source of truth in articles, in the news, in validation from politicians or celebrities, or in words in a history book. You have to feel it for yourself, by yourself. I believe everyone feels it but not everyone chooses to believe it, see it, or care for it. In this, by refusing to acknowledge even the smallest discomfort - a grief a penny could purchase, we fail fundamentally at being human.
Your writing is beautiful, Propti. Consider me inspired to assign some well-deserved meaning to "The missed connections, the delicate exchanges, and the serendipitous lore..." Thank you for your point of view!