The kindness of strangers

She was never that keen on meeting new people, 
but when strangers appeared in her life, journalist 
Olivia Gagan started to change her mind.

I had spent the year before feeling, quite frankly, stuck. Stuck in a job in London, UK, that I had been in for years. Stuck in an apartment that was starting to feel too small for all the things I wanted to do with my life. I was tired of going to the same office day in, day out. Tired of taking the same route home. Tired of walking around the same places during my lunch break.

All signs pointed to me needing to move on, to take some risks, but for some reason I couldn’t work up the nerve to do it. I knew 
I was lucky to have no major problems—I had my health, wonderful friends, a roof over my head—but, still, I was dissatisfied. I was living 
life on a loop, and I was feeling cynical and bored.

I was also not particularly interested in welcoming newcomers into my world. I’m a sceptic by nature, questioning of everyone I meet. Instead of embracing strangers, I prefer to spend my time with friends I know well and love, relationships that have been decades in the making. Strangers, whether they be romantic ones, potential new friends or maybe somebody new to work with, did not feature on my radar. Which, in retrospect, might make it very clear why I found myself sitting at a bar with friends one night, pushing my drink around, complaining that nothing in my life was changing.