Last week I arrived in Montreal with no particular address in mind.

It was August 26th and my lease started September 1st. A more intelligent being would point out that there may be a problem with that order of events, but I wasn’t worried; I had already expertly deciphered the key to safety— the key to Love: white noise.

To put it bluntly, this past year has been as chaotic as a Philadelphia dumpster on fire after the Eagles lose the Super Bowl. Through the chaos, I had picked up the habit of calling a certain friend when the fire dance demanded a larger audience. During April’s Armageddon, my existential frustration reached new heights. I found myself in the graveyard of past relationships that were now six feet under; it had been progressively adorned with spiteful tombstones and loving eulogies. I brought flowers and pastries this time. I shouldn’t have allowed this to happen, and so I resurrected their ghosts and bribed them to haunt me— to not leave me. I believed that time could heal all wounds and that no trauma could ever be truly fatal, so I defied nature and kept these spirits alive in ghastly forms.

This friend wasn’t in the graveyard, he was on the other end of the phone call. This friend wasn’t a ghost. This voice would entertain my ears as the flame’s new dance routine would burn my skin.

I challenged this friend. From the graveyard, I taunted him and challenged his humanity. I argued the notion that anyone could ever Care about another person in a broken timeline of temporaries.

____________________________

“These conversations aren’t exactly always pleasant”.

“Ok, fine. Bye”.

“No, I’ve been around long enough to know it’s not ‘fine’. I have a few minutes. What’s up?”

_____________________________

I don’t enjoy being Cared for, I don’t want to be a house plant that you water to steal some personal satisfaction.

I am a person, and you are as well. We possess the beauty of ‘free-will’ and, therefore, are able to choose whether to decline or accept phone calls. We chose how we use our water. This choice is the accumulation of personal ‘free-will’.

I realize I may sound hypocritical. I realize that you may think that I would categorize this friend as attempting the ‘green thumb’ aesthetic, but he wasn’t so irresponsible with his limited water supply.

When you go on hiking trails, there are signs to remind you that you cannot leave the trail nor purposefully alter the forest in any way. He didn’t need the reminders. When he chose to entertain an adventure, he didn’t stray away from the trail nor leave a trail of his own. He left the canyon as he found it, the way it needed to be.

He had his own journey, a story that produced an elegant concert of chirping crickets.

I am still opposed to the idea that an individual could ever actively and genuinely Care for someone else. However, his active composition of white noise echoed faithful and true Love and Care.

One can never be sure of the true effects of their actions and one can never have faith in the reliability of another individual’s actions. Love and Care are not conscious pieces crafted to be replicated by orchestras for years to come. They can never be hummed ‘out of tune’ nor lack a part for your instrument of choice. Love and Care, true Love and Care, are not actively produced.

Humanity tries to control the world around them. They dream of controlling the weather and selectively breeding mutant grasshoppers. They create white noise machines and noise-cancelling headphones.

Humanity’s attempts to Care will inevitably fail when their beloved machines malfunction.

Humanity cannot Love until it abandons this pursuit and embraces the only thing they can control— their own Personhood.

Humanity must understand and embrace the lives of their canyons and mountain range in order to notice the white noise coming from somewhere up above.

This friend never intended to capture nor tweak what he heard from the cracks of my world. He let it play through his own forest of squirrels. This isn’t to say he was apathetic. After all, he never tried to overpower what was. He chose to accept my noise when it leaked over and I accepted his. Our worlds were given a Faith to find comfort in. They were able to hear a supernatural power to remedy their existential worries. This abstract entity can not be affirmed— it is for infinity.

I have been blessed with wonderfully unpredictable white noise, that only grows louder as my people become more open-minded to more sects of religion. They harmonize and converse and are unable to maintain a melody.

Personhood is selfish. You embrace a deliciously self-indulgent world of your own cravings. But you will create your own white noise. You will learn the bounds of your own Personhood. Love and Care will defy these bounds and make your world Heard. You won’t be able to not infect the worlds of others. The invading sounds will become clear. You will be able to dissect the limitless foreign harmonies that penetrate your imagined cage. I promise, your storms translate to just another song— easily accepted white noise.

I followed such harmonies and stayed with a few friends during my week of couch surfing.

Personhood made them easy to gift— easy to accept comfort from.

I used to think I kept the ghosts because I Cared, but limbo is torture for all those involved. To Care and Love is to Live Fully and write affectionate folklore for the beautiful anomalies that choose to ‘haunt’ you. If you listen hard enough, there will always be white noise from the winds and relentless bees; you will never have to produce your own.