2013-07-06 | Face to Face
Every day, strangers cross our path. We don’t take further notice of most of them and they turn around the next corner and are gone. With some you make eye contact and, occasionally, this causes a reaction in us or the other person, be it verbal or nonverbal.
Other times we automatically talk to unknown people, e.g. when we order in a restaurant, receive costumer advice in a shop, or ask for directions on the street. Disregarding the moments in which we specifically approach a stranger out of sheer interest in making that contact, we therefore encounter a variety of people all along and everywhere during our lifetime. And for a brief moment, each one is part of the other person’s life.
At times I find it amusing or even exciting to wonder who may just have crossed my path. Who I’ve just seen for a fleeting moment. Who I may just have spoken to. Who they might be, what they might do, what dark secrets they might have. What may have happened in their life so far and would I be impressed, jealous or shocked if I knew?
Sometimes more evolves from chance encounters. For this to happen, a certain mutual sympathy must exist. Then we enter acquaintances, friendships, relationships. We invite someone to occupy a more or less important part of our life. We exchange sentiments, actually get to know a bit more of each other and are willing to disclose more of ourselves.
This usually has a direct effect on our personal life. Be it an unconscious change of our own attitude towards life through another person’s perspective. Or be it a conscious adaption of our own lifestyle, in order to have more time for somebody or make that time more enjoyable. Encounters can make us change directions. Right instead of left. Backward instead of forward. Upward instead of downward. And everything vice versa.
What would have happened if we had gone right the opposite way? Who would we have encountered? Would we have never met the people that we do know now? Who would be our friends? Who did we miss in return? And would we be the same person we are now?
As interesting as I find these thoughts, they’re ultimately insignificant, as we have gone our way and arrived in the Present. We’ll continue walking and each day new people will cross our paths again. They will have an impact on us or not. We will have an impact on them or not. But it’s fascinating to imagine that, each day, you make a tiny part in the life of complete strangers.
We run into each other. No matter if we stop or continue walking, our lives change through that to some extent. Minimally. Maximally. Who knows.
