Yesterday, Scott and I walked down by the lake and sat on the steps for a
little while. Not too far from us a guy was playing guitar, quite well I
may add; two men stopped to listen and talked to him a little bit.
Then, to my complete delight, Guitar Guy passed his guitar to one of the
strangers who began to pick out what sounded like a piece that you’d
normally play on a classical guitar. I felt unreasonably happy at the
exchange. What are the odds that someone walking by can play guitar too?
Or more pertinently, I was marveling at the fact that someone walking
by could have hidden in them knowledge that connected you to them—in
this case, the knowledge of guitar. People can be such props and extras
in our lives. Just shift the frame and it’s a completely different story
though: they walk by, you walk by, you run past them sitting at the
union, they watch you go. You’re an extra in someone else’s story too.
Which is why I thought it was so cool that randomly, momentarily,
people passed a guitar around, sat down, and played some music. I
watched Neil deGrasse Tyson’s video about “The Most Astounding Fact” on
youtube (set to music and sights of space that bludgeoned you over the
head with the sheer gravity and size of his message) after he came to
talk on campus (where in the world is…), and he says “that’s really
what you want in life isn’t it—you want to feel connected.” Because
suddenly, that person stopped being an extra. Suddenly, you made a
connection. No matter how brief or how long.
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