Half-Seen

A librarian, a library drama, and the uneasy art of being yourself in full view

Sometimes I catch myself noticing strangers the way people notice me,  in passing, without context. In my case, they often see “the Actor’s wife” first, and whatever else I am second, if at all. A kind of half-seeing.

In a past life I was a documentary filmmaker. One of the things I loved was being able to shine the light on just one person, letting them be the star of their own story, even if only for a morning or an afternoon. I miss it. Maybe that’s why I sometimes stop when I could keep moving. The other day at the library, I stopped.

Ameera is a biomedical student and part-time librarian. Young, neat, that quiet prettiness you only notice if you look twice. She was standing at the desk when I asked if she’d mind doing a mini interview for my Substack. Shy at first, but then, I think, a little pleased. Happy to be asked a question. Happy to chat. Maybe just bored. It was a slow day.

I asked her what her dream was, but she didn’t get the chance to answer because a very agitated woman came storming across the floor, furious about a man FaceTiming his family. He was a bit loud, yes, but nothing outrageous.

Her voice cut through the usual library hum. Heads popped up over laptop screens. Ameera and I went over to the man. The woman followed, still talking at him. A couple of students nearby looked delighted at the drama. We rolled our eyes at each other, one of them laughed and made a face. But not Ameera. She stood there as a kind of witness, not taking sides. The woman was rude. The man defensive. Eventually, he shoved his phone away and stomped out towards the café across the road. The woman sat down and started muttering into a notebook. Ameera smiled and shrugged. I thought it was a job well done.

The whole thing felt like theatre,  the angry woman as outraged citizen, the man as inconsiderate stranger, the students as delighted audience. Only Ameera seemed outside the performance, just doing her job.

Back at the desk, she told me about her dream -  to somehow fuse science with her love of literature. She lives with terrible allergies and wants to write a book about them, and maybe, one day, turn that into a way of helping people. Her family wouldn’t think writing was sensible. She’s worried about the future; all her friends are. None of them know if there will be jobs. She says she can’t “sell herself” in a world that runs on social media. She’s shy, so shy she wouldn’t let me take her picture.

“I have more anxiety than excitement,” she said. “All my friends do. I just don’t know where I’ll be in five years. But maybe one day I can write.”

I get it. I’ve just started posting on Instagram and feel ridiculous. There’s this weird tension between witness, actor and marketeer. Between who you are and who you think you need to be  and somehow Ameera managed to sum it all up without even trying. I love writing the Substack, but the minute it goes up I want to delete it. Slightly ashamed, slightly absurd. Who the hell do you think you are? Like Ameera, I’m not entirely sure what I’m doing here.

My friends worry about their health, not their job prospects. But Ameera’s worries feel familiar.  That queasy sense that everything is a performance, even the stuff you actually care about.

When I got home, Daughter Number One reminded me that Zadie Smith doesn’t do social media or even have a mobile phone, and sent me an interview link. The Actor, having no opinion on any of it, tried to show us his latest card trick, which mostly involved dropping cards on the floor. The dog, who’d been tied up outside the library and missed the whole drama, sulked in the hallway.

Later, it occurred to me Ameera might already have the perfect skillset: stay calm, keep things from blowing up, and move on. I’m still waiting for that to kick in,  decades older, and still learning how to step outside the performance.