Author John Koenig created this project in 2012 called The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows. It’s a collection of new words, not official Oxford Dictionary words, but words that are lacking in the English language used to describe everyday feelings.
One word that has stood out to me for years is “sonder”. The definition reads “the profound feeling of realizing that everyone, including strangers passed in the street, has a life as complex as one’s own, which they are constantly living despite one’s personal lack of awareness of it.”
As I’ve passed by people on my college campus, watched my teachers leave their classrooms, left people who I’m acquainted with but don’t know well enough to know their story, I wondered what they went home to. What their relationships were like. Their goals and aspirations. Did they ace that test, did that person they like text them back? Are they happy right now or are they hiding a darkness they feel? Tons of personal questions that I’ll never know the answers to.
I wonder about the billions of people I’ll never talk to or even see.
Traveling this past semester made these feelings even more powerful. As I sat at my window seat preparing to land in Rome, I looked down and saw a person riding on a bike on a narrow street, most likely unaware that I was above them and watching. They have a name, friends, a family, an entire life that I will know nothing about.
When I was sitting on the metro in Prague on the way to class, I saw a young woman sobbing and looking at her phone, while no one asked her what was wrong.
In Berlin I watched an old woman approach a teenager and ask for a cigarette – he gave her one, they laughed, and then they parted ways.
I watched people who spoke in languages I didn’t understand conversing with friends and strangers a like. I saw people laughing, crying, sober, drunk, on their way to work, on their way to a party, sitting by themselves, sitting with friends and significant others. All I can do is wonder how they are.
It’s a sobering feeling and a joyous one too. It’s feeling connected to everyone I pass if only for a brief moment. The human experience is a beautiful thing. I think that with the current state of the world where almost every new story is heartbreaking/fear-inducing/maddening, it’s easy to forget that. But traveling reminded me of the little day-to-day feelings of people. I hope to never forget that.
