Taking You For Granted

How wedded we are, creatures of routine, creatures of leisure, to the frail illusion of convenience. It’s only when our car stalls by the side of the road, as we try to describe to the friendly AAA representative where we are over the cell phone, that the illusion flickers. It’s only as we try to make small talk with the uninterested tow truck representative that we realize that comfort can be detached from guilt only to the extent that we are detached from necessity. It’s only as we nod with earnest sincerity to the mechanic’s prognosis that we know how far from home we’ve wandered.

You’d never recognize yourself if you met yourself. Not really. The figure in the mirror is familiar only as your exact opposite. In our own skin we enjoy the perception of perfect synchronization, and of spatial awareness knit into a unified whole. But in a room, left to right and right to left, a self-conscious smile and a swipe to brush the hair behind the ear, this other you would be as a stranger.

Similarly, the unexplored land is right around the corner. There be dragons. All it takes is a turn of the head at an unexpected moment, one that catches our expectations off guard. And when we are at the mercy of serendipity, we often get to meet another stranger. The stranger who is ourselves when we haven’t had time to practice.

Related Tales

» “What the Other Hand Is Doing” (26 of Apr, 2003)
» “Terminal II” (03 of Apr, 2003)
» “Terminal” (31 of Mar, 2003)