We've all heard of the six degrees of separation. If you haven't, the theory goes like this:
We're all just six people away from the person's presence we covet most. This could be a celebrity, our favorite sports star, the love of our lives, a long-lost biological family member...the list goes on.
This means you are just six people away from anyone in the world. You all know somebody who knows somebody who knows somebody who knows somebody who knows Ellen Degeneres.
You get the point. My story goes like this:
I am a pop culture fanatic. I have always loved celebrities and glamour, but my obsession seemed to go through the roof around the time Kim K's butt x-rays came out (you can decide if there is any correlation).
I tend to show more of an interest in high profile, high-class celebrities, and anyone close to me knows my all time favorites are George and Amal Clooney. Well, this weekend, my six degrees of separation between myself and George Clooney dwindled to just one degree.
I am studying abroad in Italy and my parents were visiting. As we were on our way to a wine tasting in Tuscany, the driver of the taxi service said, "I drove to Lake Como last night." My immediate association with Lake Como is George Clooney, as it always is. I was like a bloodhound. My senses were heightened.
About a minute later he said, "It was someone you know, an American."
I immediately responded with, "Who was it, George Clooney?" thinking there was no possible way that it could have been. The driver smirked. As I questioned more, I realized that he wasn't making this up. After much interrogation, research on Google, and heart palpitations, I realized that Clooney was in fact in Lake Como and there was no way the driver could have been making this up.
That is when I realized that I was one person away from George Clooney. One degree of separation. In fact, I was quite possibly only about twelve hours from separation. I also got to experience what a heart attack feels like.
The world can seem so big at times, but it's theories like this that make it seem just a little bit smaller, and sometimes that's comforting. We say "What a small world!" or "Everything happens for a reason," and in reality, the world is anything but small, and reasons are unexplainable. Some people would say it's not a small world and it's just fate.
Some people would say that I will never meet George Clooney, and I remind them of that singular degree of separation.
Some people will say that it's simply fate.
Whenever you feel alone, always remember that anybody you need is always just six people away, and a lot of times, they're even closer. The people you need may just be George Clooney.
