Stranger Confessions

By Sara Shields (Contributor)

Do you really know the person sitting next to you in class, waiting in line in front of you at the cafeteria, or the person you just bumped into running down the hallway?

In this series of photographs and quotations, I will attempt to show how similar, yet how different we are from each other by asking strangers life’s biggest questions.
– Sara, a fellow stranger

Question: “What was the happiest moment of your life?”

“When we got our puppy! We had picked her out from a place in Ottawa, but she wasn’t ready to take home yet so they told us we’d have to wait a few days. The next day when I got home, I looked at the couch and saw her tiny head pop out. She jumped off the couch and I immediately picked her up. I held her while she licked my face and wagged her tail; essentially going crazy. She was so cute and perfect, I couldn’t stop smiling.”

“Bollocks! Uhm that’s a tough question…” he laughs. “I would have to say when my little sister was born. We have an eight year age difference, but I still remember when she was young, she’d come sit on my lap while I played video games and tell me what to do with the characters. It was the cutest thing.”

“That’s a complicated question that comes with a complicated answer. It’s impossible to identify just one happy moment when there have been so many. I’ve realized that the happiest moments of my life so far have been the ones when I thought less, when I didn’t overanalyze anything and let myself be present.”