Liminal spaces

Tuesday, 12 November 2024

This year I traveled the most in my entire life. I spent a lot of time in liminal spaces (airports, train/metro stations).

I have some loose thoughts.

Liminal spaces are empty or abandoned places that appear eerie, forlorn, and often surreal.

– Wikipedia

A liminal space is the time between the “what was” and the “next”. It is a place of transition, waiting, and not knowing. Liminal space is where all transformation takes place, if we learn to wait and let it form us.

– r/LiminalSpace description

Part 1. Arrival

I arrive at the airport at night, sometimes with someone, but usually alone. You said your goodbyes. Made memories.

A last glimpse of the city I’m leaving behind.

A few times I had an overnight layover. Even huge airports become mostly empty at night. It’s easier to spot a rat, running between empty chairs, than other human being.

It’s eerie.

Part 2. Transition

Once you go through security, there’s no going back.

In that moment, the present dies and becomes past, forever. For-fucking-ever. But at the same time, a new future is born.

The past feels safe, known, comfortable. The future, on the other hand, is an unknown.

Will the future, that’s just beginning, be better than what I’ve experienced so far?

Will it be worse or better? How to even decide this?

I never know, apart that it will, for sure, be different.

Part 3. Difference

Even if I come back to the place I’m departing from, it will be different.

Everything changes. People change. Circumstances change. I change.

I am richer for experience, but poorer for those few millimeters of water that became tears.

2024-11-12 – Liminal spaces
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2024-08-16 – Cirrus CI is the best CI system out there
2024-08-14 – Going to Berlin for Droidcon/Fluttercon
2024-06-25 – I was awarded Google Open Source Peer Bonus
2024-06-04 – My journey to Google I/O ’24
2024-05-11 – GitHub Actions beg for a supply chain attack
2024-03-19 – Writing a custom Dart VM service extension (part 1)
2024-02-08 – On using smartphone for things that make sense
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