It is. I am.

I was heading home from an aimless jaunt into the city center around an hour after sunset when I met two men. They introduced themselves, and we began to talk. We probably talked for a couple hours. I’m not really sure. It was one of those conversations I have come to treasure--the ones that fade the relevancy of time. When I got home, I just couldn’t shake two of the questions I’d been asked.


“How big is your community?”
“Where?” I asked
“Back home.”
I wasn’t quite sure what he meant by this. A slideshow of people ran through my mind, ranging from family, friends, students, colleagues, neighbors, baristas, and so on. I could make a case for all of these people being part of my community. I sought clarification.
“Whatcha mean?”
“Your community. Who is in it?” He responded.
This did very little to clear up my confusion. “Well, my community is very large. I’m not sure how to answer the question.” He looked at me the way an old professor looks at a new class of out-of-touch, naive freshmen and said, “Your community. Not everyone around you. The ones that get you. The ones that know who you really are. The ones you could go to at any time for anything. The ones you choose to spend your time with. The ones you keep closely updated on your life. The ones you see often enough to nearly call family.”
“Oh, ok. Let me think about it for a second.”
I took the lump sum of people from my earlier grouping and began to shrink that number--boiling water down to salt. I was thinking for about 30 seconds when he interrupted me and said, “This is taking too long. If they don’t come to mind right away, then that’s not what I am talking about mate.” He looked me in the eye and said slowly and encouragingly, “Now...how many people are in your community?”
I told him my number.

“That’s a good number,” he said.
“It is.”


Then he asked me a question I have been asked many times before, but this time stands apart from the others.
“Have you ever been in love?”
“Yes. I have.”
I can still see his face as he received my answer--the unmistakable expression of pure interest.
“How many times?”
I paused a full second and answered him. The conviction in my voice stunned me, but not as much as the number itself. In that moment, I was more honest with Sean than with any other person who has ever asked me that question, including myself.

“You are lucky,” he said.
“I am.”



I’m still not completely sure why I felt so comfortable offering him this personal answer. Maybe it was the directness of the question. Maybe it was the setting--a purely honest setting: sitting with our backs against a park bench, sharing a piece of cement sidewalk, shadowed and unnoticed, with two men who were wearing the only clothes they owned. Perhaps it was the person asking it--his genuine interest, as he had nothing to gain from my answer, no connections, no judgment. He could do absolutely nothing with it...except know, except relate. And maybe it was just me wanting to be honest.

Two genuine men asked me two real questions. They had no practical reason to do so, but they did anyway.