Stranger Still

At dinner this evening, a stranger sat down at my table as I tried to finish a class reading. Before long, I gave up and decided to see what this person was all about. She looked to be in her sixties and had already consumed a carton of rice milk. She wore a colorful cardigan over a turtleneck sweater, and she'd carried nothing with her. In short, her appearance was enough to intrigue me into a conversation.

After some general discussion of the Madeline Albright panel that took place on campus this afternoon, we got to talking about more personal stuff. She told me that she was a part of this group that "sounds like a cult but isn't one." I tried to keep an open mind, and then she said "death isn't real to me." After that, she told me how the man she loved didn't love her back, that he'd moved out of her house and that his return was unlikely. She told me about her 92-year-old mother, with whom she speaks on the phone twice every day. Recently, she's noticed that her mother's voice is changing, and she worries that her mother is getting very sick in a way the doctors won't be able to help.

It was all very strange. I wondered what experiences had led her to the table where we sat, and whether she'd imagined her future accurately when she was young. I wondered if she'd had meaningful friendships, and whether she'd been able to maintain those. I wondered if she was lonely, or happy, or both, or neither. I wondered if she felt like she'd found answers.

There is, maybe, a sweeping point to be made here, but I can't be bothered to find it. Some things can't be tied up into neat little bows of clarity and order, and isn't that spectacular?