all the stories we may never hear

Echoes of an idea, an idea that led to this blog post, have been ringing in my brain for a couple of months now. The hope was that this vestibule of conception would eventually coalesce into the refined blueprint of an esteemed building, sort of like the Louvre (bad timing?). Reality would have things murkier than planned, and the echoes I once heard have now made way to only very slightly louder yawps. Figured now is as good a time as any to pen my thoughts down, lest they be lost to the shrines of my forgetfulness.

I am reminded time and again, in conversations with friends, in the sights I see, books I read and the music I hear, of my place within the world. The grandiosity of scale oft hurts to think about, but proficiency of conception was never really a strong suit.

In the happier moments of my everyday, I think about Jim1 who manned the reception of the falafel cart I frequented weekly when I lived in Seattle. Manning the hull of the proverbial ship for what genuinely felt like every waking moment of every day, Jim was a beacon of light to inebriated twenty-somethings who needed fuel to function after what was sure to have been a long night for most. Seeing Jim had become, by this point, a weekly ritual for me. In moments of celebration after the laborious pset; in moments of sombre following an arduous day, really, the ensemble of reasons for which I would rationalize a visit to this falafel cart only seemed to grow as time went on. What started as this quest for the quintessential gyro and fries experience I had so desperately craved since moving from the Middle East soon became something more than. Patient smiles that greeted me from across the street and asked me how my day had been. Tsk tsk… that scrumptious falafel wrap was now more of an added benefit as opposed to my main intention of going.

This pattern of unexpected connection would follow me, it seems, wherever I went. This year, coincidentally, was also the year my phone battery figured out how to reverse the process of entropy2. Truly spectacular, how it would go from a full charge to completely depleted in less than a couple of hours. It seemed at some point that the battery indicator was more of an indication than anything else, and my power levels depleted stochastically until they hit zero. As one can already imagine, this is quite inconvenient, especially since I was still charting through the unexplored in the sunny and still to this day, foreign city of San Diego. I headed to a transit stop, which I had naively presumed would take me to the long-awaited shelter of my inviting apartment.

After what would be the usual amount of time it took me to get back, I looked outside only to realize I was in the middle of a suburban landscape that led not to my apartment but another sequence of confusingly named buildings and apartment complexes. Weary and frustrated after a long day of classes, I hurried to find my way back and eventually made it to a bus station that FINALLY took me where I needed to be. My battle was far from over, however, since my phone had entered its critical point: a four percent charge, with the app on my phone being the singular way I could access my transit card. Kevin, the transit driver, catches sight of my haste to scramble my belongings together and perceives immediately the truth of the situation. In a nod of acknowledgement to my superannuated mobile phone, he let me on free of charge. We shared the ever-so fleeting glance, and in our exchange, I saw in him the venerable sibling who seldom let me pay when we went out on a celebratory occasion.

Part of moving to San Diego has been accepting that I just might never have bagels that live up to the kind I regularly consumed in Seattle. Given my proclivity for bread, however has materialized in an expedition for the best bagels in San Diego. A couple of weeks ago, a new franchise location opened nearby where I live, and their specialty was the dipping bagel. Glint in my eyes, pep in my step and purpose to my focus; I headed to take my place in a drawn-out line of individuals who had the same ideas as I did. Over there, as I was checking out with my bagel order, I conversed with Lucy about the different varieties of orange juice and how pulp content wasn’t the only dichotomy one could distinguish based on. During the cadence of our conversation, I am taken back to my friend, who made it his life’s mission to try every single variety when we went to travel in lands not our own.

There are quieter moments too. I visit a book-store; possibly in search of quiet places to do work where I don’t feel compelled to order to stay, possibly in search of the next read to get fixated over3. I stumble upon Marie, who gives me her recommendations on books that she recently enjoyed. While taking me to their aforementioned sections, we, to Marie’s surprise, encounter spilled green m&m’s on the floor. Pursed brows and a look of amusement on her face, we ruminate for a couple of minutes as to how they could have gotten there. And finally, I think about Nathaniel. He shares with me his zeal for life, for food, for experiences. In his utterances, he shares his recommendations of the material: books, movies and existential. Somewhat surprisingly, his advice turns out to be remarkably useful.

It is no secret to anyone that our identity and any semblance of novelty that’s associated with it come from how it evolves under interaction with different people. To those apathetic souls, it may seem like an admonishing reminder that there is little to us that is immutable. Cognizant of this fact, I can only hope that there is a more positive interpretation to all of this. That this leads to an ever-renewing sense of pleasure in discovery and maybe in a general sense: pursuit.

I’ve been thinking about what all of these moments add up to, these seemingly disconnected exchanges with strangers and acquaintances alike. Folks whom I may never encounter again, who have now all somehow become part of the architecture of who I am. And in this realization, I find not loss, but an abundance I hadn’t anticipated. After all is said and done, my experiences have taught me that, much like Hilbert’s Hotel, there is an inexplicable vastness to the depths within which I can accommodate yet another person, of whom I will forever carry traces of their spirit.