We are all just strangers, aren’t we? Ships passing in this lonely night, and should we meet a stranger who sparks a light in us, we walk with them, for awhile at least. But none of us leave together. It is both our tragedy and our delight as humans. So tonight, I ask, if strangers is all we are, do we ever really know someone? Behind the smiles and the laughter? Can we ever really know someone? Does anyone really know me? Sometimes I think yes. But then a wave of loneliness hits, and I realise that perhaps we never can, for we are not coins, two sided and flat, but prisms. So in this life the best we can hope for is to be understood. That the people closest to us will take the time to try and understand the very complex creatures we are.

I seek to be understood. Perhaps that is why I write, so someone might glance a paragraph and think, yes, I understand you. I see your passion, your sorrow and your joy. Maybe then, when I am understood, when I am taken as a whole, complex and imperfect, full of dreams and darkness, I can look back and think perhaps I was not known, but I was understood. Perhaps that is when the loneliness ends. When you can look into the eyes of those around you and know they choose to stay, because they are your people, the ones who understand.

G S Scribbles