Certain Eerie, Nervous Feelings

During intermission at a concert the other night I found myself standing just a few feet away from three well-known European cellists. It was noisy in the lobby, but as I concentrated on trying to make out what the three were discussing I realized they were talking about whether to stay for the rest of the concert or go out for burgers.

The experience reminded me of some researchers I interviewed recently about their work in digital speech processing. They’d just developed an algorithm that did a particularly good job of filtering out wind noise and other environmental sounds when people spoke on the phone in the car.

I’ve interviewed a lot of researchers over the years -- physicians and microbiologists and computer scientists and many others. And yet knowing that all these smart people are out there devising all sorts of beneficial things hasn’t diminished the frequency of certain eerie, nervous feelings I have.

Intimations that something horrible is about to happen at any moment.

I’m able to escape these feelings for brief periods when out with friends.

Or for those few moments when I’m struck by something unexpectedly lovely -- like the unaffected way one woman lightly holds another woman’s arm on the street.

Thoughts of people I’ve known can have a similar effect -- especially the recollection of a particular moment we spent together. That instant in line at the art museum, for example, when Roxie glanced to one side.

But just as suddenly I can also be struck by another sort of recollection -- an older kid, say, telling me there’s a poison so deadly that even a quantity the size of a lettuce seed can kill you in a matter of seconds.

Then I feel like a small, vulnerable child wishing someone would let her inside so she could find a cool, dark place to hide.

And then you gently remind me that it’s my turn.