Voices
It is here, deep in your belly, that
Loneliness has set up shop, shakes
out a blanket on the futon, makes a
copy of your key and settles in.
Crossing the world seeking adventure comes at the cost of routine
comforts and organic friendships.
Sports meetups and sponsored
bar crawls can buy you some GMO
friends, artificially grown over the
slightest of familiarities: “You like
watching soccer?! I like watching
soccer!” and “You arrived through
the airport, too?!”
These fast connections can
be invaluable, uniting strangers
of various backgrounds over the
common desire to understand different worlds while satiating that
companionship craving. For some,
these friendships last a lifetime,
but others find that while clinging
desperately to each other like two
freshmen on their first night at
college, the relationship is fleeting and at the end of the day, has
an expiration date printed on your
plane ticket home.
You debate whether to synthetically stuff your void with food or
souvenirs. You select a restaurant’s
sidewalk table so you can vampire
bits of life from the cheerful passersby. You hope the waiter will ask
how you are, but it turns out that
JOANNA
ZELMAN
HUFFINGTON
10.13.13
here you order