Every now and then the opaque inner workings of the YouTube algorithms points us to something we feel so privileged to have discovered that we almost want to thank God for algorithms. This is Water is the title of this commencement speech given to the 2005 graduating class at Kenyon College by David Foster Wallace.
As I listened to this speech I kept wondering how it could be that the same man who's delivered this message of hope and wonder and love for a life spent looking outward is also the man who in three short years would be dead by suicide at the age of 46.
Perhaps that too might be some piece of the central message of this incredible speech. Bottom line: we may imagine we know or understand who someone is at their core but we must never forget that we are always simply engaging in speculation courtesy of our imagination. That impenetrable wall that separates us all from the rest of humanity is both unbearably painful and miraculous and everything in between. It's how we look that forms the frame.
And I suppose that's a big part of why we write.
