I love small world connections; they make me feel like I am
part of a community wherever I go. Two of them happened yesterday evening in
one place.
I’d gone to an author reading and interview at a bookstore
in Brooklyn. Shortly before it started, a black woman sat at the end of the
first row; she looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t quite place her. And
just as the author was being introduced, a woman with curly blonde hair sat in
the empty seat next to me. She looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t say anything
because the author was beginning to read.
As soon as the event was over, we turned to each other and
almost simultaneously said, “Were you at the Voice?” Then she said, “Are you Sonia?” I nodded, and said, “I
remember your last name, but not your first,” and she said, “Barbara.” She had
been an intern for one of the investigative reporters, more than 30 years ago,
and we hadn’t seen each other since, though it turned out she’s later been
hired by the husband of a college friend of mine.
And the woman at the end of the first row? We’d met at a
writers’ event a couple of weeks earlier and, we learned last night, she’s a
colleague of a good friend of mine.
So, yes, we are no more than a few links away from everyone
else on the planet, and only one or two from those in our own city.
