Have you ever stopped to think about all the people you meet, exchange a few words with, then never see again? Or people you see and talk to every day, but never really get to know? People such as the waitress at the diner, the woman who rides the same bus you ride every morning, the postman.
It's not by accident either. We're adept at making temporary contact and forming transient relationships.
I bought a piece of used exercise equipment (a powered treadmill) last night. To begin and complete the negotiations, I exchanged several email messages and one telephone call with the woman selling the treadmill. Her name is Anne. We drove into The City and picked it up at her flat, in a neighborhood where we don't usually have any reason to go. (That aside, even if we were often in that neighborhood, she's moving in a week or so).
We met Anne; we met her roommate, who had given me the directions over the phone. Anne showed us the treadmill and how it operates. I thanked her and exchanged money for treadmill; Rich and I and a friend of ours lugged the thing down the stairs to the car... and that was that. Off we drove. We'll (probably) never see or interact with Anne (or her roommate) again.
She appeared to be a pleasant person. She had a nice smile. We have absolutely nothing obviously in common other than the facts that we both have email accounts, use craigslist.org, and share some level of interest in exercise treadmills (mine ramping up, hers ramping down). If she hadn't decided not to take the treadmill when she moves and if I hadn't decided I wanted to buy a used treadmill (and looked for it on craigslist on the day I did) we never would have met. Now, transaction completed, we'll most likely never meet again.
I'm not saying I should try to pursue a friendship with Anne. I'm not saying you should invite the woman on the bus to have coffee after work. I'm only commenting on how many such transient relationships we all form and break every day. We're all ships that pass in the night. We see each other; we honk our horns; then we're gone again. Sometimes we pass in the daytime; sometimes we pass frequently, on regular shipping routes. But we never really intersect. It's all a normal part of life with other people.
Today I stopped a while to think about it.
Comments