He seemed concerned, for the most part, maybe a bit annoyed.
He asked, “What makes you happiest?” and I told him bicycling did, being outdoors, creating things.
He made a sound of intrigue and then told me he found happiness in sex.
“Are you serious?”
Yes.
Okay, well, I suppose I can respect that. I know a lot of people who can only find happiness in interacting with others, connecting with others, melding with others, sharing with others, becoming a part of others. In fact, I don’t think I’m much different. Without a healthy dose of human interaction, we would all go mad.
What truly makes me happiest?
Sitting in the middle of crowds, comfortably alone, listening to the conversations around me, while chatting away in my own head to the only person I know who is as undeniably bewildered about myself as I am. To be caught up in the neon buzz of life exposed before me, while that small, familiar jingle goes on and about behind my eyes. To meditate on my inner turmoils and tranquilities while smack in the center of our swarming modern society.
Walking through wilderness until I find myself face to face with a glorious sight. A sight that just nearly takes me out of my skin, gives me a good shove, throws my heart into a nice, firm skip, and watches me as I fall into oblivion. A sight that makes me feel small and fragile and smothered, but not insignificant - just a small piece, chipped out of something much more magnificent and bold. Speeding down pathways on my bicycle, the wind whipping past my cheeks. All my hair is pushed out of my face and, for a moment, it feel like my skin is pushed away as well. The layers of my body peel away and I feel like I can see and feel everything the way it was meant to be seen and felt. As if I’m not a person so much as I am a part of the wind, of the skipping rocks that shoot from beneath the tires and pierce stiff blades of grass, of all the dust and pollen and moisture, of every damn bug that attacks the corners of my eyes and mouth.
Not having to explain myself, not having speak at all, because I’m sitting beside someone who knows me better than I know myself. I imagine that would make me happy, but how can I be so sure of finding true happiness in something I’ve never experienced.
How do we know what makes us happiest when we’ve hardly brushed the surface of experience at all? When we’ve hardly even come to understand ourselves, the earth below us, or the vastness above.
For now, I’m happiest finding solitude in chaos.
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