Passing Fury

Many years ago I wrote a short story in which the main character is dying of cancer. While walking down the street one day, it suddenly strikes him that at least some of the people he’s passing are also gravely ill and dying. It is a revelation which makes him watch the world much more closely afterwards.

While out for a walk, I got a call on my cellphone from a friend who’s in a very bad place emotionally. I stopped in the middle of a courtyard to talk to them. Our conversation was long and intense. People passed by me laughing, talking and sometimes smiling when we exchanged glances. Some of them were also talking heatedly into phones as they passed. Once again I wondered how many times do we pass others on the street without ever thinking this moment or time may be incredibly important for them, life changing even. In the fifteen seconds it takes to walk past someone talking on a phone, they are being told their negative medical test results, or that their sister just gave birth, or something else ominous or momentous. Without knowing it, we are inadvertently in their *space* when a huge piece of their life slides into place forever.