It is my personal belief that it takes two full months to become acclimated to a new environment. As of this date, Seattle has been my home for 1.5 times that long, although our apartment is still technically in its trial stage. My conclusion thus far? I think I like it. I still feel like an outcast. In fact, it seems to be a town of outcasts. As a city, Seattle definitely allows itself to be modeled to suit the needs of its inhabitants. And they, the individuals and their needs, are diverse.
I catch myself on the bus, playing the well-groomed young woman with important places to go, turning a blind eye to the goons, drunks, gutter punks who pick fights and dismiss the bus driver's orders. Other days I am the eccentric, dashing in front of traffic to make the bus, chatting up the driver, catching a free ride.
Outcast. To fit in. Does not every thinking man, whose existence is defined by his self-consciousness, feel apart from the masses? Most of my life I have felt, to some degree, an outcast. In elementary school, attending speech class made me feel different than the rest of my class. As I grew a little older and become too preoccupied with adult matters, I spent a lot of time hanging around my teachers and reading novels that should not be given to children. Every other weekend, the slight social life I had cultivated was disrupted to spend time with my dad in Traverse City. In high school I spent most of my time working on different extracurricular projects, and my social life was principally conducted online. I remember several Friday nights from my junior year spent hanging out alone at Borders, hoping to meet someone new. In Chicago, I was too busy working and going to school to drink and do the sorts of things many other college freshmen do. The first time I felt that I had truly found my place was, ironically, as a foreigner abroad. The expatriate community was one I could claim as my own. That gusto for self-assertion travelled back with me to Ann Arbor, and together we found happiness and home -- or at least, a sense of belonging. Somehow over the course of these past few moves it has become detached and has lost its way.
Anonymity. The plight (or pleasure) of every city dweller.
Most likely, society did not reject me at all, but rather I unwittingly withdrew myself.
How do adults make friends? Why do we need friends? Is it an instinctual, animalistic need to feel a part of a community? Apart, a part. Why do some people need more interaction than others? A simple chat over breakfast completes M's social needs, but I am not content to write my thoughts to myself. Happiness is a sunshine-infused cocktail and banter shared with a friend or two.
Do performers -- when they perform -- feel separate from the audience? Or is the urge to put themselves on display a way of connecting with others? When actors raise their eyes to meet the audience, do both sides not feel an almost awe-inspiring sense of solidarity?
Is it by becoming one with the crowd that the individual pulls away the most? By forgoing an exchange and forfeiting a contribution of independent thought, he is not working to benefit the collective.
What drives people to perform? How do they benefit from minimizing the distance between reality and imagination? Why is this lack of distinction between the two defined as psychosis?
