I’ve known Alice for almost 20 years, maybe more. We’ve never known each other very well. We just know all sorts of things about each other: where are your kids now; how are they doing; where are you living; are you seeing someone; any trips coming up? I’d be open to talking in greater depth, but somehow we’ve never done that. Still, she’s become a significant marker in my life, my time, my geography just because there have been so many hellos. Each suddenly each one feels richer than the last.
Some folks still share the sidewalks with family members and people they grew up with. Not me, although I’ve found a few of them on Facebook. There are the school people: friends; enemies; others; teachers. The work-related people layer up from early work life, having young children, charitable boards and the current rafters. Then there are spouses, ex-spouses and hanger’s on. Sometimes there are old lovers and the people you get to know through them. It’s a creamy rich stewpot on charitable days. Those days, I’m grateful to have them all out there connecting me to the far distant frame of this picture.
Now that everyone knows our Portland secrets I suppose it’s not a surprise that I almost never going out in public without running into someone I know. For me, it started when I’d been here for six months. I love it. I start to panic when I don’t run into a huggable person before a performance starts. That stress will no doubt be alleviated at intermission, whether I’m at a movie, opera, rock concert, mainstage or weird scene production.
And now a lot of those people reach a certain status. There are the twenty and thirty year folks; that’s really something. What kind of a something? Something like mirrors and measuring sticks, inching out my life connection by connection.