Several years ago, while driving home from my then girlfriends house late at night I would occasionally see another driver on the street. Often times seeing this person would make me think about how there are people in this city awake late at night driving home. The thought occurred to me that I would never know this person’s name. I would never know why they were up so late. I would never know their home. I would never know there family or friends. In short I would never know this person.

There in the car next to me waiting for the green light I would think about the absolute certainty in never knowing anything about this person. But then a more powerful thought would come over me. In Omaha there are at least 400,000 people of which practically all of them I would never know. Taking the realization that I would never know anything of this human next to me and to think there are 400,000 more would cause me to reflect on how many people there are.

Of course at this point my chain of thought would lead me to population of the planet. There are over 6 billion people that I will never ever know. Six billion people with names, families, things, and aspirations and I will never know on any kind of personal level. Six billion people all sitting in cars right next to me, driving home waiting for a green light at some random intersection, in a random city, in a random state, in a random country. It really is a powerful thought.

Six billion

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