Sonder: Clara’S Story

By Emily Neiman

When Clara was six, a feeling washed over her that she would never forget.

It was a moment of epiphany for the young girl, the moment when she realized that every person she passed on the street had their own life, with their own problems to deal with. They were so much more than two-dimensional characters of her imagination; they were people, real people, with real lives, real families, and real problems.

It wasnt until she was much older that she learned this phenomena is known as sonder. The experience and the word would come to define her young life.

As she grew into an observant and compassionate young woman, she too dealt with love, loss, heartbreak, and sorrow. But in taking the time to look beyond the surface, she also learned that the world is not as lonely as it once seemed.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Feb 3, 2015
• ISBN: 9781491760048

Emily Neiman

Emily Neiman aspires to be a director and writer. The twenty-year-old is a film student who plans to blend her creative and intellectual interests professionally. Emily also hopes to one day understand the complexities of human emotion—or at least experience it. She currently resides in Ontario, Canada.

Book preview

Prologue

Sonder is one of those obscure words that you do not come by often. I only learned of its meaning a couple of years ago and have since been completely enthralled with the word. The definition of sonder is quite simple: it is the feeling you get when you realize that everyone around you, every person you pass on the street, has their own life, with their own problems to deal with. These people are not just background characters in your life. Every single person you walk by on the street has a name, a mother, a father – maybe siblings, maybe not. Some may have places they call home, and others may have nothing. These people are not just two-dimensional characters written into the book you call life.

I knew the feeling of sonder my whole life. It sat in a dark corner of my heart, completely unnoticed. I didn’t know the name of the word, but the feeling – that’s what I knew. Every time I stopped what I was doing and just watched people, this feeling of breathlessness would wash over me. I felt that maybe I wasn’t truly alone. I wasn’t just one in seven billion.

I think I was sixteen when I realized that the world is a lonely place. You can have friends and family. You can have a pet even, but you still get these moments of sadness when you feel as if you’re completely alone. My moments would hit me at school, when I was walking to and from my classes. I had friends, really good friends, but I never felt complete. I never felt that I was a whole. There was always a missing piece of my puzzle that I couldn’t find. And I never did. But that’s a story for later.

My mother always told me that I was mature for my age. Having this realization at the age of sixteen, which is basically the year leading up to your self-discovery, was pretty intense for me. I didn’t handle it in a mature way. I never handled things in a mature way. I realized that my mother meant that I saw things and understood things in a mature way. But I handled them differently. I wouldn’t talk about them. I bottled them up deep down inside my gut, letting them stir and fester until one little thing would send me hurtling over the edge into a pit of molten anger.

However, I also didn’t handle anger properly. I didn’t scream or yell or allow profanities to spew and drip from my filthy mouth. I pushed people away and told them not to talk to me, for weeks on end. I stayed in my room and only left for school and work. I never exploded publicly, only in the confines of my own room. I didn’t know what I was capable of when I was angry. My eyes didn’t glow green and I didn’t burst out of my clothes, but I was still scared of what might happen if I allowed myself to let go and allow the fury to fully encompass my being.

So I stayed in the safety of the four walls of my room, and I screamed into a pillow. I cried by myself. My mother would question whether I was okay, and I would nod and ask why she was asking me. You look upset, she would say, and I would just shrug it off, saying that it was nothing and I was perfectly fine. I only allowed myself to become angry in public twice in my life, and it was with the same person both times. But that also is a story for another time.

Chapter 1

The first feeling I ever had of sonder was when I was about six years old – which is odd because six-year-olds don’t have feelings. Well, they do, but basically only two of them: happiness and discontent. I, however, was mature for my age. My best friend then was named Andrew, and he was the boy I played trucks with in the sandpit during recess. He had brown curly hair and deep-set dimples. His eyes were a bright blue, and freckles crowded the bridge of his nose. He had a small scar under his right eye. Andrew’s shoulders were broad for a six-year-old, but he wasn’t very tall. I was taller than he was, which was odd because I was considered short for my age.

Andrew had a truck that he always played with. It had a blue body and green plough at the front. The back left wheel had broken off, so he had replaced it with a Lego wheel. Of course, with the Lego wheel, the truck wobbled