Something of Our Own
I was in Tompkins on Thursday evening having one of those revelations of a perfect moment.
I was sitting on a bench in silent companionship with a good friend. There were too many good things around us to list on both our fingers combined. Good weather, sheltered by the evening, the kind that foretold summer days soon to come. A gathering of friends surrounding us, those with two legs and those with four. An inconspicuous sunset, not quite vibrant enough that everybody needed to photograph, but just enough to admire with quiet appreciation. “A Hugging Spot” etched in yellow chalk, just in front of our spot, watching strangers do just as it said. It was, in short, a perfect moment. Just good things to hold in my mind throughout the night.
Throughout my perfect moment, there was a man. Old, Asian, soft lines worn into soft skin, soft gray blazer, a soft demeanor. He sat criss-cross-applesauce in the middle of the pavilion. Just sat right there on the concrete ground. He was praying. To what higher power I could only guess, but he was praying with such care, such heartfelt emotion that his soft body trembled with it. In witnessing his joy, I realized that perfect moments are unique to each of us. There are endless good things in this world, but the joy they give is ambiguous between one another. Having grown up in a Godless domain, I could never derive the certain facet of joy the man in the park seemed to cherish from his prayers. I would not experience joy in an identical way to my friend who shared the same park bench as myself. I couldn’t explain my joy to another, in the same aspect that I could not relate to somebody else’s unique joy. These good things in the world are not part of a perfect equation. These good things do not equal joy and joy is not encapsulated in a singular sense.
I am witnessing this mans joy, adjacent to the joy of countless strangers, in the way a foreigner approaches her travels. Recognition leads to falsified understanding, and I am experiencing what could only be described as a shared moment in an utterly personal way. What becomes of a girl who allows others joy to manifest into her own? I could feed off that feeling in that park for the rest of my life, and never be left wanting for anything more. I could seize that personal-impersonal happiness and place it under a pretense of being solely my own, and carry on for the rest of my days in a state of bliss. What could be so great about knowing yourself, after all? Must we really distinguish joy in such scrutiny? To trample over such a delicate thing with a pretty foot, what could be a bigger sin?
The most joyful moments I’ve experienced have been those created within the realms of my own jurisdiction. Moving to New York, finding handfuls of these perfect moments in a life I built. They creep up quietly, in times dictated by no one other than myself. It is the type of joy that feels justified in a way childhood joy could never compare. The type of joy that feels earned. Empowering. Personal. Moments that belonged to me, in ways unobtainable to everyone else.
It’s a fickle thing, joy. The king of happiness and all its subjects. Rarer than its friends in contentedness, gratitude, and all hedonic entities. It cannot be found or replicated. In its absence, you will still stand tall, but in its company, you will be greater than the Earth you stand on. It’s hard to imagine such a force as delicate. It’s reveals itself to you, passes over you, washes you over in a way all too sudden to comprehend its nature. Joy, in the plural, seeks a lonesome friend. In finding its companion, it warps in ways to compliment its suitor, tailored to fit perfectly within the bounds of their existing identities. And as we change, our joy changes with us.
Going back to that night in the park. Yes, I could see that man’s joy triumph. I was witness to my good friends joy emanating towards me. I felt the simultaneous joy of strangers pounding through the plaza like a heartbeat. But I knew none of their joy quite as well as my own. It’s a sacred thing, to be able to own such a feeling. To call it yours. In the way the God-fearing man claimed his, and my companion claimed his. In between the lines of that moment, where we were so close to humane perfection, we found our own divine perfection in joy. Shared, culminated, attested through each of our own desires and pride, yet so personal. A moment of our own, a feeling of our own. That night in the park, it belonged to everybody who shared it. But our own memories distinguish it in the capacities of own unique joy. What that night meant, that is what will always belong to us.
Nobody can take our joy away from us. Nobody can replicate it. Nobody can claim it as theirs. Truthfully, it is one of the few things we will always have as our own. I cannot speak on what joy is, or where to find it. I believe it hides in different places, places that might only be found by a single person. To know yourself, I suppose. That is your answer. Not where to find joy, but where you find your joy. How you find it. How you create it. I could tell you about mine, in tales measured by lifetimes. And you can listen and relate and understand but even after it all, your joy may only be recognizable to you. There’s something to be said about that.
