Chuck Palanhniuk, author of Fight Club (on which the movie was based), says in the introduction to his book, Stranger Than Fiction,

If you haven’t already noticed, all my books are about a lonely person looking for some way to connect with other people.

In a way, that is the opposite of the American Dream: to get so rich you can rise above the rabble, all those people on the freeway or, worse, the bus. No, the dream is a big house, off alone somewhere. A penthouse, like Howard Hughes. Or a mountaintop castle, like William Randolph Hearst. Some lovely isolated nest where you can invite only the rabble you like. An environment you can control, free from conflict and pain. Where you rule.

Whether it’s a ranch in Montana or basement apartment with ten thousand DVDs and high-speed internet access, it never fails. We get there, and we’re alone. And we’re lonely.

I live in an urban center amidst coffee shops, bars, and public transportation, but occasionally I drive out into a neighborhood deep in the heart of the suburbs, the kind of neighborhood where you take a maddening series of four lefts and three rights just to get to your destination, which is likely a cul-de-sac. I don’t know why I do this. Sometimes I’m picking something up I’ve purchased on Craig’s List. Sometimes I stalk a house that’s for sale, wondering if I might want to move there, where sirens and horn honking and drunken street riots are less frequent.

But about the time I’m taking my sixth turn off the main road I start to feel a tightness in my chest because the isolation from the heartbeat of community makes me claustrophobic. The thought of having to drive everywhere makes me queezy. The thought of never bumping into someone on the street as I walk with my children makes me sad.

This so-called American Dream sounds lonely to me.

Not everyone is called to live like I do, in an urban neighborhood. You may live in a cul-de-sac, you may live alone. That’s not really my point. But as Believers of Jesus we are called to live outside of ourselves, however that may be in our context.

As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world (John 17:18). Jesus didn’t send us to live in the church, or to our kitchen table, or to the couch in front of our television. He sent us to be part of the culture around us.

Normally I am the shy, socially awkward girl who talks too much about herself when she’s nervous. But recently I have experienced an epidemic of extroversion. I don’t know what specifically has made now the time for this to happen, but I am suddenly making conversation with everybody – at the coffee shop, in the locker room at my gym, at the park, in the library (my cafe friend, Peggy, is pictured). It is extremely uncharacteristic of me, but I have been abundantly blessed with new friendships and resources and one-off conversations.

Jesus has given me the power and courage to love people the way he loves them, despite my social hang-ups.

Who are the people you bump into every day? What kind of conversations have you struck up?