I often describe myself as a misanthrope, an individual cell of the societal body, violently independent from the whole. I am hostile to the ideologies of my neighbors. I do not appropriate much of my time to their petty and over dramatized social games. I have no regard for their useless sentiments and ill conceived ideals. Alliances of convenience have me posted in the trenches of their culture wars. My enemy in such is alien to me, and I can in many cases claim to abhor everything that he stands for. With a slip of the tongue, I may call him villainous and evil. He is the great Satan to me and I to him.

This separation is not unique to me. Human civilization has defined itself since its conception by the ways it can find to divide itself. Even putting aside the obvious divisions between large scale factions in religion and philosophy, each individual one of us is an island unto his or her self, separated if not by ideals then by experience, interpretation, imagination, communication; the very air between each of us has us divided. We will never know the same cosmos as our neighbor. That is why we fight each other.

We spend the entirety of our lives listening to no one else's thoughts but our own. That is what it means to be lonely. The naive realists don't see it as such. They live for an instant, spend that instant locked in an empty chamber; they hear a voice and feel they have company, but the voice is their own, a rough translation of sounds reverberating from beyond the walls; they mutter the sounds back to themselves, applying their own internally conceived context to it. They think there's someone there to talk to, but they're only speaking to themselves.

So is it foolish of me to suspect, even hope, that despite all of these dividing elements there is a common thread that runs through us all? Are we not all fragile creatures, born of the same stuff and aware of our tininess, our own helplessness, our own isolation, our own impermanence? Can't a humanist atheist look into the eyes of a devout Christian and with all the sincerity in the world say to her, "I understand."

Can't we derive some comfort from knowing, that no matter our frailty, no matter our isolation, we are all in this miserable mess? Can't we relate on at least that much?

We are all mortal, and it hurts, but at least we're not alone in that. I wonder how many see this as I do.



All we wonder,
No-one ever denies,
If once given life we must die.

So bow down with me,
Where summer fades into fall,
And leave your hatchets of hate.
Bow down with me,
And sing the saddest of all,
The song we all serenade.

On my way home, I was approached at a bus stop by a man who took note of the fact that I was reading the last few pages of an Ayn Rand novel. His immediate intent was to identify my political and moral alignment with Rand’s philosophy as well as to ascertain my familiarity with her. I can’t be certain of his motive, but he was satisfied enough with my outlook as to carry a conversation with me.

He was in his forties, very articulate, finely dressed and kempt. I suspected some kind of ailment or substance abuse, as he seemed to produce beads of sweat despite the blistering cold and was suspiciously jittery. He discussed with me his recent purchase of property in the neighborhood and revealed himself an entrepreneur in several projects, a certified pilot (for which he produced a license of some kind), a teacher, and a libertarian. He spoke of travels, of plans, of odd tid-bits about flying and about the city’s zoning laws. He spoke about ethics, about academics, about libertarianism, and about healthy living.

We boarded the same bus and the exchange continued. I do not believe that I can adequately convey the depth or variety of knowledge that he demonstrated as we proceeded down the bus route. The startling fact is that I was so caught off guard by him that I forewent my stop and stayed on the bus, listening to him for an entire circuit and a half of the bus route. It must have been two to three hours.

For that entire time, he spoke incessantly; he did not pause or hesitate once, and I contributed no more than twenty words and much nodding. It was not a discussion, it was a unilateral dumping of knowledge and ideas; he could hardly speak fast enough to alleviate the buildup of thoughts and subjects as they rapidly occurred to him. I did nothing but listen. I suspect that if I hadn’t chosen to leave when I did, he would have continued for several more circuits. I only left because I was beginning to suspect ulterior motives for his carrying this exchange. Such was not expressed in any discernible fashion, but the possibility of such had come into my mind.

The fact that I stayed so long revealed something about me, because it’s strikingly uncommon for me to socialize with people. My “friends” are all intellectually, emotionally and physically distant from me, and I normally categorically refuse to socialize with or entertain the company of other people, so this behavior was unlike me. People have approached me at bus stops and at school before, and I dismiss their company rudely. What was different about this man was that he immediately convinced me that I was his intellectual inferior, or at least on par with him. That’s what captivated me, because I so very often, and in such an arrogant, stubborn and latent fashion, see the people around me as being beneath me. It captivates me, however briefly, when I find an intelligent individual with such a profoundly deep and intricate internal structure. Perhaps I yearn for that kind of company without being wholly aware of it.

There is a hidden longing in me for a connection with someone. It’s a dangerous impulse. I suspect it will take years to stifle and kill it completely, but I will succeed at that.