Someone Else's Ocean

by Kate Stewart

“I mean, we are all just extras sipping coffee in the background of someone else’s life. But that could change at any second. If I wanted to, I could put my coffee down and become responsible for you. We are all responsible. We could all choose to take responsibility, couldn’t we? Human compassion. What the hell happened to that?”

THERE’S A NAME FOR HUMAN awareness and it’s called Sonder. The definition: the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness—an epic story that continues invisibly around you like an anthill sprawling deep underground. It’s a pocket in time, where you may redefine life by the idea of the struggle of others.

“What is it with the freakish waves today? That came out of nowhere!” “Just obeying the moon, I suppose,”

It was my one and only warning to rid myself of a life that was slowly killing me anyway. I obeyed. I yielded to that warning. And so, I’m here living someone else’s life, in someone else’s house staring at someone else’s ocean.”

Trailing my fingers down the piano keys, I tried in vain to keep the tears from surfacing. Before he left and after our signing lesson, he’d played for me daily while I lit candles and uncorked some wine. We’d taken great care of our bubble before it burst. Disco came running at the sound and when she realized it was me, she resumed the wait of her master in front of the screen door.