Separation Anxiety

When I reached the park to see the fireworks there were not so many people there. But they kept drifting in; whole families with children on dads’ shoulders, crying infants in strollers, older folks with sons and daughters on their side. They brought folding chairs and their picnic food. Americans can’t possibly go anywhere without taking food with them, no matter how short a period they are going for.

As it grew darker the park got packed tighter every second. People kept coming closer and closer to each other. And we grew accustomed to people around us. I was surrounded by people who perhaps took me as a permanent fixture of their environment, just like I took them to be. The Tamil man who wore an Intel T-shirt; the man and woman who had two teenager girls with mouths full of braces; the Chinese family that kept talking to the child in the stroller in Chinese. When the fireworks started we were really huddled, violating each other’s personal space. There was a woman on my right whose elbow touched my elbow; I turned my head to look at her. She said, Sorry. But then it happened again a few minutes later and I did not bother to look at her, and she did not bother to say Sorry.

I always look for new fireworks and there were a few I had not seen before. I want to see novelty and the fireworks people showed their creativity to me.

The show ended with a full burst of fireworks and then people started leaving. People whose presence I had gotten accustomed to suddenly left, just like the streaking stars of the fireworks that were no longer there in the sky. I felt the separation anxiety. I felt lonely.