Significance Anonymous

[Photo: Big Frank Dickinson]

Significance Anonymous (Everything does not mean something)

by Big Frank Dickinson

“Dave: Hi everyone, my name’s Dave, and I’m a meaning freak.

Everyone: Hi Dave.”

The meeting is held in a room with no windows to avoid the leakage of excess meaning into the room. The first speaker goes to the side (the front is too significant) and shares his battle with smiles. They promise so much and sometimes strangers give them (he doesn’t want to hold out expectations from strangers). Then a woman seeing (but not saying she saw) an invitation to speak on hugs because huggers smile, rose to reveal her dread of hugs. She shares her intricate way of analyzing them: how much body contact, where the hands go, the length of embrace, facing/sideways/air … it all means so much she is ashamed to say. This spawns a response from the audience (other hug-huggers) some rise to share how they overcame this, others to argue for some limited significance to certain hugs. These disputes are common. Some things do mean something, but not everything can – that’s why they’re here, to separate the two, “one day at a time”. Progress is limited; tonight the absence of a hug, it is agreed, means nothing. Nonetheless, a small man in the back is shaking his head slowly as he stares across the room (he knows that those who won’t hug aren’t comfortable hugging him). The lady across from him also now knows (she thinks) that this unhuggable man’s head wagging as he gazes at her shoes confirms that ‘practical’ is ugly, and this tells her that her dream last night during which she tossed her checkbook out the window was a clear sign to be more whimsical, which now made her smile broadly to the front of the room where the man who fights smiles now gives in and smiles back, tentatively walking back towards the seemingly whimsical woman.