Encounters with strangers can be a humbling reminder of the vastness of the world and of each other, the impossible-feeling truth that each one of us contains an entire universe of inner life and a singular perspective, that as a species we have an incredible capacity for kindness, cruelty, courage and creativity.

There’s a certain quiet violence in realizing you’ll never know most people deeply. You’ll never see the little rituals that hold them together. Never hear the thing they say out loud when they’re alone in the car. Never know how they feel about rain on Tuesdays, or whether they sleep with one leg out of the blanket, or who first taught them how to... See more

Sonder reminds me that the world isn’t built around me. That everyone is carrying their own epic—full of grief and joy and contradictions—and that, most of the time, I’ll only ever get the briefest glimpse. But what a thing to glimpse.