David Foster Wallace gave a commencement speech at Kenyon
College, and it is published in the novel, This
is Water. In the speech he talks about what makes up the daily grind of life.
The boring, frustrating, tiring, endless grind of adult life. After foretelling
this future he presents the choice we have to make in that crowded supermarket
at the end of a long day. We can give in to our natural desire to be angry and
frustrated or to make the choice to think the best of those around us. The
world is boring, frustrating, and tedious. This is an undeniable fact. But
there are two options from that point. We can fall into the belief that we are
the center of the universe and the universe should conform to our needs and
desires and be angry and frustrated when it does not. Or we can look at those
around us and see the possibilities of the circumstances that surround them. It
is easy to forget that everyone around us is just as complicated as we are.
Everyone has had their own unique circumstances that brings them to that
supermarket. Those circumstances may be tragic or heroic, but in any case we
don’t know what has made them into the person that is now standing in that
supermarket line. The recognition of these possibilities help us see the
humanity in people. They are not just obstacles in our way, but people with hopes,
dreams, frustrations, and feelings as complex as our own. So when we stand in
that crowded supermarket at the end of a long day, we can look at others and
see the infinite possibilities that surround them, we can see that they are
humans making their way through life just like us. We are not the center of the
universe, so we might as well appreciate the universe that we are a part of. We
have to make the decision to imagine others complexly. When we can make that
choice, to see others as people and not just things, we give ourselves the option
to love others. When we can love others, life becomes so much brighter and less
of the frustrating, boring, tedious grind. So when you are in that supermarket
and every cell in your body just wants to go home and for everyone to just not
be there, you can stop and make that choice of seeing the beauty and complexity
in others. Everyone is human, this is water.
