I have written about the longing for connection in a previous post, but there is an aspect of it that I have always wanted to take a bit further. That is commonalities. Living in Miami for so many years since childhood, I had become accustomed to a very eclectic group of people. Even though each area has a higher concentration of a specific group of people, for the most part you are surrounded by a fruit salad of races, ethnicities, personalities, etc. This causes people to relate to each other on how they don’t relate to each other. In other words, it’s their differences that makes the connection. When I started traveling, I realized that this is not the case everywhere else, and this only holds true as long as your differences still fit inside the BOX, the standard model of how an American life should be lived.
When people meet, the sharing of stories causes commonalities to emerge and that usually leads to further encounters. There’s a hindrance to this classic model. And that is living outside the box. It’s sort of like traveling at different speeds on a highway and trying to roll down your window to speak to the other driver. Each person runs at a different speed on that highway and depending how different your speed is, they may never be able to see you. So many times, I’ve had long stays in towns, have met amazing people, and have not seen them again. I merit this to the lack of commonalities in lifestyles. Most people usually have fully planned days months ahead, and don’t have the wiggle room to adapt their schedule, or since you are not a permanent fixture in their life, you become a non-priority. So unless you are flowing with traffic, you will not come across them again.
Somehow this theory doesn’t offer much comfort, for it’s not by logic that the longing for connection is even there. It’s an innate raw emotion that almost seems to have a mind of its own. It does help in my search for connection. Apparently at least one commonality seems to be necessary and that is traveling at the same speed, which requires finding someone who is outside the box like you are. Which is no easy task when you have stripped what holds you together with a community, like I have. So quite the challenge, but a challenge I accept.