{"id":39237,"date":"2026-04-25T02:34:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-25T07:34:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/?p=39237"},"modified":"2026-04-25T02:34:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-25T07:34:09","slug":"like-an-alien-i-move-through-a-world-i-can-see-but-never-touch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/?p=39237","title":{"rendered":"Like an alien, I move through a world I can see but never touch"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I stood in a park near my house the other day and watched people.<\/p>\n

It was a normal scene. The new leaves of spring made the trees look green. The light came through in soft patches. People moved in both directions \u2014 talking, laughing, walking with purpose. Nothing about it would have caught anyone\u2019s attention.<\/p>\n

I was standing right in the middle of it.<\/p>\n

I wasn\u2019t pushed aside. Wasn\u2019t ignored. Certainly wasn\u2019t rejected.<\/p>\n

But I didn\u2019t feel part of the scene. I didn\u2019t feel like those people. I somehow wasn\u2019t one of them.<\/p>\n

I could hear pieces of conversations as people walked past. I could tell who was relaxed and who was distracted and who was in a hurry. There was nothing unfamiliar about what I was seeing.<\/p>\n

It felt like a scene that I was close enough to recognize, but not close enough to step into. I didn\u2019t know how to belong<\/em> there.<\/p>\n

When I was younger, I would have reacted to that feeling differently. I would have felt some combination of frustration and anger. I would have assumed something needed to be fixed \u2014 either in me or in the world around me.<\/p>\n

I would have tried to close the gap. I don\u2019t feel that way anymore.<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t about loneliness. It\u2019s not about being excluded or left out. It\u2019s something else.<\/p>\n

There is a kind of difference that doesn\u2019t show up on the surface. You can live in the same places, follow the same routines, speak the same language \u2014 and still experience everything at a slightly different angle.<\/p>\n

Not enough to separate you completely from the other people, but\u00a0enough that nothing quite lines up.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t think most people notice that I don’t belong among them. From the outside, there\u2019s no obvious sign that anything is different. I look like I belong there as much as anyone else standing on that path.<\/p>\n

But internally, my experience doesn’t seem to be the same as theirs.<\/p>\n

My conversations typically don\u2019t quite connect in the way they seem to for other people. Their shared assumptions don\u2019t feel right to me. There\u2019s a sense that whatever it is that ties people together is present \u2014 but just out of reach for me.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no hostility in that realization.<\/p>\n

If anything, there\u2019s a kind of quiet respect for the way other people seem to move through the world. They appear to be connected to something that holds together naturally \u2014 something that doesn\u2019t require constant interpretation.<\/p>\n

I can see it. I just don\u2019t seem to access it in the same way. And here\u2019s the part that matters most.<\/p>\n

I know I\u2019m not the only one.<\/p>\n

There are other people who experience the world like this \u2014 people who see the same patterns, feel the same disconnect, and move through the same spaces with the same sense that they don\u2019t quite fit the social structure around them.<\/p>\n

The problem is that I don\u2019t seem to encounter those people very often.<\/p>\n

Or if I do, we don\u2019t always recognize each other right away.<\/p>\n

So most of the time, it feels like standing alone in a crowded place \u2014 aware of everyone else, but not connected in the way that seems normal for them.<\/p>\n

That doesn\u2019t mean connection isn\u2019t possible. It just means it isn\u2019t automatic.<\/p>\n

And when it does happen \u2014 when I do find someone who sees the world as I do \u2014 it matters more. There\u2019s a depth to it that I don\u2019t get from casual interaction with most people, because it isn\u2019t built on shared assumptions. It\u2019s built on recognition.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s the kind of community I find myself longing for.<\/p>\n

Not a large group. Not constant interaction.<\/p>\n

Just a few people \u2014 a community \u2014 who understand what this feels like and who recognize something in me that fits something in them.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t think this is something that changes.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t think there\u2019s a point at which everything suddenly lines up and feels natural. I think it\u2019s something you come to recognize over time.<\/p>\n

You stand in the same places. You see the same things. You understand what\u2019s happening around you.<\/p>\n

But if you’re like me, you experience that world in a slightly different way. And after a while, you stop trying to force their world to be what you want your world to be.<\/p>\n

You stop assuming it\u2019s a problem that can be solved.<\/p>\n

You just learn to live with it.<\/p>\n

And you keep an eye out for the others \u2014 those who also feel like aliens observing the human world from just outside the frame.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I stood in a park near my house the other day and watched people. It was a normal scene. The new leaves of spring made the trees look green. The light came through in soft patches. People moved in both directions \u2014 talking, laughing, walking with purpose. Nothing about it would have caught anyone\u2019s attention. Keep Reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-39237","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1x9iR-acR","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39237","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=39237"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39237\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39245,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39237\/revisions\/39245"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=39237"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=39237"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=39237"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}