The Wren, the Wren

by Anne Enright

We don’t walk down the same street as the person walking beside us. All we can do is tell the other person what we see. We can point at things and try to name them. If we do this well, our friend can look at the world in a new way.

I say ‘fell in love’ because that is the technical term for what happened. There was no gap, no need for translation. I felt understood, merged. And this feeling was euphoric.

Most of the time, I think, people aren’t listening to each other, they are just waiting their turn to speak.