Someone in the Crowd

2:01 PM

There is something about the city that can instantly make you feel so small. So irrelevant. Seemingly unknown. It’s humbling and also terrifying.

To add to my moment of self-loathing, D.C consists of a hub of some of the most influential people in the world. Making me feel that much more insignificant.

My thoughts didn’t end there. I was standing in line to get into The National Archives when a girl in front of me caught my attention. Not for reasons I’m very proud of admitting because I couldn’t help but stare and draw conclusions and make up stories in my head of ideas of what could explain her baldness. Not just her lack of hair on her head, but no eyelashes, or eyebrows. I instantly pitied her and thought what most people would.

Cancer.

I wanted to know in that moment, to know her story, even though it was none of my business, my curiosity tends to get the better of me.

She was beautiful. Young. Close to my age I would assume. She stood tall, smiling and laughing with the person next to her, who I concluded, but could be terribly wrong, was her sister. They shared similar eyes. As the line trailed up to the inside of the building, she smiled at me and held the door open. I smiled back. That would be the first and most likely last exchange I will make with this girl.

It’s interesting to me that hundreds of people gather in a hub that we call a city and we pass by people in crowds hardly seeing them or ever knowing them.

There really isn’t some profound conclusion I came to when thinking these thoughts. I didn’t come up with a study of people you encounter in your life that you never really get the chance to know, but it did make me want to become more aware of the world around me. And the people in it.

People have so much to offer. Even if it's brief and has hardly a ripple on your life, each person has some sort of effect on you, no matter how small.

I hope I can step out of my comfort zone more this year and talk to someone I would normally never bother to make conversation with.

When did it become so odd to say hello to a stranger? It may be an American thing. Or just a me thing. I’m shy by nature but not just that, I’m private and don’t want to be intrusive.

Who.gives.a.shit.

Saying hello to someone isn't going to ruin their day (never say never though.) Conversation can be wonderful. It could also lead to conversations you may immediately want to leave and wish you had never said hello in the first place, but look at it as a story you can tell someone later.

So, go say hello to the person next to you and if you immediately feel too awkward to progress the conversation, just run away.

I’ve done that before!

They will think you're really weird after the fact but at least they thought something of you.

Hey, you can’t win over them all.

With that I’ll conclude with a song from the movie “La, La, Land,” coincidentally titled, “Someone in the Crowd.”

“Is someone in the crowd the only thing you really see?

Watching while the world keeps spinning round.

Somewhere there’s a place where I find who I’m gonna be

A somewhere that’s just waiting to be found”