hello. i see you.

I’d see you.

I see you.

I see you sitting on the sidewalk, sharing a cigarette with the passer-by.

I see you climbing out of your Tesla, checking yourself out in your rearview mirror.

I see you with your three suitcases, trying to maneouver yourself down a busy city street, and I wonder if that is all your life’s belongings stuffed in, rolling alongside you.

I see you sitting on the beach with friends, Friday night, sharing a big ol’ bag of Popcorn Twists, laughing, but also talking serious stuff, as the sun sets.

I see you, with your teenage daughter in her fancy UGG slip-ons and short shorts, sharing the delight of sea glass, and her lapping up your undivided attention.

I see the crow following you down the beach, and how you reach out your hand for it to come closer to you, and when I pass you by and make a comment about your friends, I see your wet eyes when you say, “they are Dave’s, you know Dave right?” And when I shake my head no, I see how you sigh and tell me how Dave was the old guy who always picked up cans and how he had a jacket just like yours, and how he died a little while ago, and now these his crow friends, are your friends.

I see your pink hair and goofy grin as you walk the beach asking for a lighter, determining who to pass by and who might actually have one.

I see you as I open up my container of street food and how our eyes both lit up at the exact same time, and how I saw you again two days later and we we still grinned, a connection through salad.

I see you alone, yesterday and today, in the grocery store, and quietly again out on the street, slow.

I see you taking photos of the flowers, wide-eyed and filled with joy as you turn and say, “it’s just so beautiful.”

I see you in a wheelchair, pulling yourself along the sidewalk so slowly, step by holy step, and how dozens of people pass you by. I see you.

I see you, most of you, look down just before we meet each other on the street, eyes diverting a hello, an uncomfortable moment of being seen, of seeing.

I see your eyes light up and the yelp that escapes your mouth when I met your smile with mine and you cheered that someone had said hello to you.

I see you in your not-dressed-for-the-weather outfit, the exact, I mean exact outfit I think I wore circa 1998, and smiled, remembering.

I see you in your beat-up red pickup truck and your yellow ballcap and the way you nodded and smiled when I did the same to you.

I see you young adults playing, playing on the beach, sticking logs in the rocks and working so hard for an hour to get them to stand, just… because. And the way you stop and thank your friends for helping and the way you hug each other good bye, but not before taking a selfie, together.

I see you there with the cushions, the bed, your home, in the back of your van.

I see the young lovers cuddling, sneaking a kiss, listen to them talking music and film and drama … oh the drama.

I see the ones too, huddled in the corner of the bookshop with the sex book out on her lap, him huddling over her, whispering quietly.

I see the couple walking hand in hand, her leaned in towards him, them talking about taking chemistry in highschool, and I grinned. Highschool was at least sixty years ago for each of them, and that might be generous.

I see the proud Dad snapping photo after photo of his daughter sticking her head through the sunroof of a shiny white Jeep.

I see rainbow colored hair and fancy coffee cups and people holding plants in the front seat of their cars like babies, even though the backseats are empty.

I see you and you and you and you and you and you with your ear buds in and headphones on, maybe darting your attention away from being quiet, being alone, being here, maybe listening to something that keeps you here.

I see you.

I read a book once where the author took eleven walks around her neighborhood with eleven different sets of eyes, starting with her toddler, and among others a naturalist, a type setter, a sound designer, a person who is blind, a dog. Each one of them seeing and noticing and offering their attention to different things, each one highlighting the multitude of that which we don’t notice.

I’d see you.

Amidst beautiful weather and scenery, plants and trees and flowers and smells and mountains and oceans and stores and restaurants and cars and architecture and boats and sidewalks and and and … I see people.

I see you.

I see the mom and daughter buying a birthday gift for a party they need to be at in half an hour.

I see the young girl selling stickers on the corner of the road and the kids squealing at the beach. I see the two middle-aged men sitting side by side on the picnic table and sending each other off with a long hug.

I see the server with her bright eyes and beautiful gravely voice and dozens of scrunchies, her heart-felt comments, her aliveness.

I see the one who is laid out on the corner of the street, and the other who is slunk down. I see the one who stops to help. I see the one with no teeth and the one whose smile lit up the night when he caught mine.

I see the number of folks who are on their phones when they are alone, looking down, talking, typing.

I see the ways we walk by each other again, and again, and again, passing each other by.

I see the way dogs allow us to approach each other in ways we so often don’t on our own.

I see how natural it is to divert our attention as we approach one another, and that it’s a practice for me to hold steady eye contact, calm presence, to turn towards, to smile — ready to offer and maybe even, receive a greeting …

Driving down the streets on a beautiful spring day, all of us with our windows down, the street so tight, our cars so close, the traffic so slow, we could reach out and touch hands if we wanted, yet none of us look at each other.

I see you.

I thought to myself, it’s okay if they don’t see me, I am seeing them, I am giving the attention, this is what I do, this is something that I can offer. Witness.

But as more and more people pass without noticing me, I wonder, how long can we actually do this? How long can we pretend that we exist in our own little bubbles, that we don’t need each other?

"People today are like detached seaweed.  I don't want to be detached seaweed and I don't want others to be detached seaweed ... the majority of people are lost, you are "supposed" to be independent, it's all about the individual succeeding ... but that makes people lonely, it just separates us.  You never find that thing you need, which is community and relationships and one another ... relationships with all things." 
- L. Frank 

“The beginning of the revolution is to say Hello,” I listened to Martin Prechtel say the other day, “saying hello, keeps you alive and keeps everything around you alive too. To say hi to someone you have to notice them, and to say hi back, they’ve got to notice you back. It not only says I’m here, but you’re there, you’re here, too. I see you, I know you’re there, and because you bounce it back to me, I am here too.”

I looked up the word Hello.

Apparently, it only harkens back to the beginnings of the telephone — instead of the usual term of ship greeting, “ahoy,” or longer forms of greeting, the word “hello” was chosen as the official greeting because it was efficient. Of course. Previously, hello was seen more as an expression of surprise, or a way to attract attention.

Full stop.

Surprise. Attention.

What might become possible if we said hello because we are surprised and delighted by one another’s precious beingness, and because by doing so we call attention, our attention, Life’s attention – to your being, to our being, to my being. We acknowledge and are present to the miracle that we get to be alive together on this mysterious planet at the same time? What might become possible if we saw each other? If we slowed down enough to see… and be seen?

If all that is what is truly wrapped up in a Hello … I guess it would be mighty “efficient” then, wouldn’t it?

" ... to say we see you ... it is more than just greeting ... it's an invitation to deep witnessing and presence ...  it also means to acknowledge and recognize each other, to bring each other into existence ..." 
- Roche Mamabolo

This morning someone waved across the beach to me. Passing each other with a hundred feet between us, she waved her arm way up in the air, swinging it back and forth, as she greeted me, the only other human on the beach.

And I waved back shouting, “Hello, good morning.”

I see you.

Thank you for seeing me.

Here we are.

She couldn’t see my smile, but it was there.

Until Next Time …

N

P.S. … Apparently I also see what is on your windowsills: binoculars, bobble heads, cats, succulents, plants, alcohol bottles full and empty, paint and brushes, pottery, vacuum, stuffies, red Solo cups, dried flowers, stained glass, dream catcher, one plant, a window full of plants, greeting cars, a ‘Best Mom in the World’ ornament, greeting cards, exercise equipment, hats, files of paperwork, picture frames, bottles of all shapes and sizes and colors, tinsel, a Buddha statue, police tape, candles – burnt and unburnt, books, treasures from the beach, flags, easel and canvas, Christmas decorations, twinkle lights, a box of random stuff squished up against the blinds, a black crow with a plaid scarf, a cactus, rocks.

Which is a poem in itself, but really just another way of me … seeing you.