I think we love to feel nostalgic - discovering an old toy while cleaning up, the diary we forgot about until we open it again, the hobby we used to have and the songs we cried to - because we stand further away from the past now, thinking: Wow. Look who I am now. And look who loving this thing made me. Nostalgia is holding our memories with the hands they created.
so I was on the bus today and just as I got up to press the stop button, something hissed behind me. I’m not talking cat hiss here. the sound that emerged behind my back was a lioness-worthy almost-roar. it was terrifying. I had to know what it was.
and of course I turn around, ready for everything because when I entered the bus, there was definitely nothing and nobody there that would have been capable of making that sound so what even could that be -
an old woman. just an old lady, and she looks at me. I swear I didn’t notice her when I got in. the bus stops. the doors open. I step outside and turn around, and there she is. I have no memory of what she wore or what her face even looked like, except for one thing: her eyes. bright like a young woman looking at me, not an old lady. I am unable to move. she stares at me, and then she says:
“don’t trust the little children.”
the bus doors close. the bus leaves.
I stood there and it took me a good minute to put myself back together. until now, I have no idea what entity I met there, and maybe I read too many books, but I sure as hell will not trust little children or old women any time soon.
“you’re destroying yourself,” he told her. she didn’t reply. “you can’t live for just your mind and nothing else. you’re human, for god’s sake. you need love, affection, you need all the things that all of us need. please. you’re destroying yourself.”
she didn’t look at him. her fingers turned the page. her eyes read. her lashes flickered shut, just a second, before she drank the words on the paper. more information. more data. all the connections and causes the world had to offer.
he reached for her, touched her shoulder. “please,” now he was begging, “you’re not a machine.”
“but I wish I was.”
“you can’t be.” he spoke gently now, hope rising up. maybe he could reach her. “you don’t have to be. it’s okay not to know things. sometimes there are no answers, or a problem that even you can’t solve. there are things bigger than any of us, and you can’t do anything to understand them.”
she froze under his touch.
he let go. he took a breath. “it will be okay. you’ll get used to it. come on.”
“no,” she said.
he opened his mouth. she turned to him, and the shine of her eyes spoke not of life as it used to, not of curiosity nor the yearning for knowledge that had made her the most brilliant creature he’d ever seen.
“who are you?” he whispered it, stumbling, terror in his voice. she was brilliant still, and it had made her -
“i am my mind.” she didn’t blink anymore. her fingers were curled around the book, a page crumpled up under her palm. “i was nothing before i could think like this. before i knew. before i could connect all the information, make nets and theories and new ways. don’t you see?” her smile spread over her lips, hesitating then, shying away from her wide black pupils.
he pressed his back to the wall. his body trembled. “you are more than this.”
“no!” she hissed. her fist crashed into the book, tears springing to her eyes. “you don’t understand, stupid, stupid! my mind could be perfect! it could be brilliant, better than anyone, it could make me special. it could make me more than just another...”
“human?” her swallowed. moved. came closer, just a step. “you don’t want to be human?”
“no. yes. I want...”
“it’s okay. you don’t have to be extraordinary, you know? it’s alright to be enough-”
“I want to be more.”
he took all the courage he had and went back to her. when he stood in front of her, silent, she touched her fingers to his chest.
“if you’re not brilliant, you’ll be forgotten.”
her fingers curled into a fist.
“I’d rather be remembered than human.”
Will we leave something behind?
Will they still know me tomorrow, next year, a century or a hundred after this?
Will our bodies echo through time like a wave along the ocean? Will our souls connect to the universe at an infinite numbers of points, each a touch, and still sing our songs when all else is gone and darkness is the only one to listen?
Maybe not. We could become nothing.
Or we could become part of everything.
We just may.
I think we could learn a lot from the robots we're building. Imagine talking to a machine fitted with an artificial intelligence that can communicate with us. We'd ask so many questions, just because we hope for something new so badly. So we'd go to the robot and ask, "What's your purpose?" The robot would make a little beep or whatever noise it chooses to signify processing of data. "My purpose is whatever you programmed into me," it would say. And we'd be disappointed. Because that's not new. "Oh." Already thinking about ways to change the robot, we mutter to ourselves: "Aren't you lucky, knowing exactly what you're meant to do." The robot hears that, of course. Maybe it would laugh, maybe not, but it would certainly reach for us in its own way of soothing. And if we'd listen closely, I'm sure we'd hear pain in its emotional voice. "Aren't you lucky, choosing exactly what you want to do?"
When I was in elementary school, a boy came up to me during break. He’d been playing soccer with his friends and the ball went sideways somehow, and ended up near me. He went after it to get it back, but stopped next to me. I was reading. I did that every break, just like he played soccer every break.
I noticed him standing there, but didn’t say anything. When he didn’t seem to be moving anytime soon, I looked at him.
He was staring at me. I stared back.
“Why are you reading all the time?” he said.
I thought it was a stupid question, so I probably sounded a bit annoyed when I asked him: “Why do you play soccer all the time?”, expecting him to get angry or make fun of me.
But the boy, I’ve forgotten his name or never knew it anyways, just tilted his head a bit. He nudged the ball with the tip of his foot, then kicked it back to the other boys. “Mhm. Okay,” he said, and ran off.
He didn’t do anything extraordinary. We didn’t become friends, we didn’t talk again and I can’t even remember his face. All he did was to say okay.
Maybe that’s all we can do sometimes; saying okay even when we don’t understand.
A human sat down at night and raised their face to the moon.
“Tell me,” they asked, voice heavy from the dark in it, “is there hope?”
The moon was silent for a long time. It let a cloud pass by, let new stars come and watched old ones dim out. Then, it said:
“Dear human, what are you?”
The human hung their head. “Nothing. I am nothing but alive, not anything.”
And because the moon could not smile, it went full and round and silver instead, and shone down. “That, brave one, is your answer. There is hope, my child, because you are still here.”
