Standing on a street corner brings insightful opportunities for observing behaviours and attitudes of passing people. What is it about the street “corner” that invites complex personal exchange between strangers?
Yes, I hear your smothered laughter at the obvious innuendo of prostitution and drugs. Agreed, assumptions lead to funny, immediate interpretations. Street corners are a classic icon of forbidden fruits.
When did street corners acquire their notoriety? Prov.7:10-23 has a biblical reference to street corners and squares as places where tempting encounters frequently took place. (All innuendos are provocatively intentional.) It follows with dire warnings to the immature in Jer. 3:3, Prov. 2:16; 5:3, 6:24-25, 7:5, etc. The mistrust for certain public spaces has seeped across generations into present days. There remains a dubious and nefarious aroma cloaking street corners.
Wikipedia, educator of sundry grey topics, offers some guidance. “The definition of “sexual activity” varies, it is often “defined as an activity requiring physical contact with the customer”. Britannica, slogs in with; “any activity—solitary, between two persons, or in a group—that induces sexual arousal” “Any activity” certainly leaves room for wide interpretations. Britannica offers a further tidbit. “Two major determinants of human sexual activity: 1) inherited sexual response patterns evolved as a means of ensuring reproduction and that are part of each individual’s genetic inheritance, and 2) degree of restraint or other types of influence exerted on individuals by society in the expression of their sexuality”.
This opens whole new levels in Pandoras’ Social Box especially when we envision the concepts of “customer service” and “inherited sexual response” to this messy mix. Both conversations bound to knock anyone off the corner curb and into a morality ditch.
Who could predict a battered cement curve could have such historical and social impact on individuals and, society?
Back to standing on my street corner again, dressed in shorts and a tee-shirt. What message do passers perceive me broadcasting simply by my extended presence here? Across from me, a road construction team is sweating in the mid-day heat. The corner flagger wearily stopping and slowing traffic, his humanity blurred by his occupation. Drivers shout abuse, seeking to bully through with the threatening power of their cars and perceived privilege. As they pass, the flagger flips them off, a symbolic reclaiming of self in a disparate social exchange. Rage spreads like a virus in the congested traffic.
A car slows near my corner, blackened windows, and expensive hubs. The passenger window slides down and I am bordered in its dark frame. He presses the gas and is gone. I don’t fit his street corner profile. Across from me the flagger briefly smiles and waves at the passing car who has thanked him for his work. Kindness spreads across the next several cars, limited absolution, before the abuse resumes.
I am full of questions, as I lean on a tarred power pole watching this micro-world. A homeless person has camped further up, bicycles and debris creating a sort of defence barricade. Oddly reminiscent of decorator crabs. There are varying degrees of invisibility surrounding everyone involved in these four squared corners. This temporary society. My positioning creates an uncomfortable and prominent staging.
Passers acknowledge me with direct, querying stares that challenge my occupation of this space. What am I doing here? As if I must provide a legitimate answer to salve internal fears. Standing here demands public explanation.
The flagger, despite his red, reflection STOP sign is less visible than I am. Less human somehow and perceived as valid targets for impersonal animosity and trauma. His evident exhaustion the combination of a brutal work environment and de-humanization. In 2020, a the height of the pandemic, he was, for a moment, an essential work hero. Claps are few and far between in 2021.
A pedestrian, steaming coffee in hand, does a curb-side side-step. Eyes targeted on her phone she deftly ignores the homeless woman plunging her hands into the wastebin searching for food. Homelessness is the absolute bastion of personal invisibility. As disconnected tent communities however, they draw endless attention and commentary. I wonder, what is the line between humanity and de-humanization. We treat stray dogs better than people around us.
The coffee shop midway up the road is bustling with sidewalk conversations and laughter. To the customers, life is “business as usual”. There is a distance from the corner. More than a few casual steps down the sidewalk. It is a world away.
Individual life experiences so close and yet, so far apart. I muse on this curious disparity. What price does society pay for assumptions? How do we define a legitimate life? Why does our positioning imply our worth? I walk away from my corner with more questions than answers.
Featured Image courtesy of and Copyright © 2021 Kvkrenner
Ken, yes indeed, airports are great places as crash sites for human interactions. Being an aware human is a struggle of creating internal balance. I look forward to more of your comments!
To possibly add to this conundrum of frequently seeking answers only to find more questions, which much of humanity globally has faced and will face, I will ask a few questions with no request for answers from anyone as I believe the only meaningful answers to these sorts of question ultimately come from within, sometimes in words, sometimes in photographs, sometimes in sentences and sometimes simply in a feeling — amidst all these ongoing questions — a sense of personal Connectedness with past, current and future Creation (or perhaps similar Creation-like labels):
1. Did you feel satisfied leaving that corner with more questions than answers?
2. Does having more questions than answers nourish the possibility of continually seeing with new eyes?
3. Does having more answers than questions imply the possibility of a life path forward of stagnation, while having more questions than answers imply the possibility of a life path forward of ongoing growth…perhaps bringing to mind the cliché ‘if you are not growing you are d….’?
4. Could one postulate the possibilitiy that “The Road Not Taken” begins at a corner?
TWTOR,
Your questions lead to further questions.I cannot answer for others. For myself, I feel I MUST ask these questions, for the sake of my own humanity. As a writer, I throw my pebbles into the waters hoping the ripples will lead to thoughtful change. We are all, as members of society, responsible for each other. Otherwise, what is a”society” and, what is a “country”?
I used to go out into towns that I lived in and people watch. It is very interesting to see that others do this as well and what their perceptions are of the people. I think this article and people watching can lead to us learning what it is to be human and what we would like to think of ourselves as human or what we need to do as human beings for others.
Yes, Robin, people-watching, can tell us so much about the society around us. It fascinates me endlessly, when I travel, how each culture is also so very different.
Thank you, Karin.
Did you ever read Black Like Me or see the film Watermelon Man?
Our brains love to generate information based on the assumption that “This might be a threat. If I’m not sure, assume so.” Depending upon how we grew up, that can extend in a very wide and inclusive umbrella indeed. Bonnie Raitt sang, in “Circle Dance,” that she learned “love is a thing that leaves,” so her DEW line ‘protected’ her from intimacy for much of her life.
If we proceed with trust, i.e. unconditional positive regard, those chimera lose their power. I know, this is a true metaphor salad. Ain’t it fun?
And, in the end, we’re all streetwalkers, aren’t we?
Be.
Mac
Mac,
Yes, I hear you. Politics rules by fear. It can be hard to find the breath of truth when we are drowning in social media hype.
There is some brilliant lines on fear in the “Dune” science fiction books that I have, in fearful times, used as my own mantra.
“I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past, I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.”
Shakespeare, in Julius Caesar, had another version:“A coward dies a thousand times before his death, but the valiant taste of death but once. It seems to me most strange that men should fear, seeing that death, a necessary end, will come when it will come.”
Not only is it an intriguing perspective, Karin, it is extremely well written!
Thank you John.
Thanks for this provocative piece, Karin. I suppose we need a follow-up now using the verbal form of the word ‘corner’, as in ‘he really cornered me on that one.’ Maybe we’re drawn to corners because they allow vision in several directions?
BE
Ah, Byron, thank you for both your clever insight and, the idea for a follow-up article! All the best!
Humanity is an interesting species. People watching can be an entertaining hobby. I spent many hours in airports when working, and airports are, like your street corner, a great place to see all the facets of human behavior. Sometimes the line between humanity and inhumanity is very vague and people can slip from one side of the line to the other with only minor nudging.