I didn’t listen to Echoes when I should have. Or perhaps I did. Maybe it found me precisely when it was supposed to, years too late yet somehow just in time.
I distinctly remember the occasion. We were holed up in some grim, forgotten motel in a big American city—these interchangeable places, the sort you only end up in when attending industrial academic conferences, events meticulously crafted for people who desperately want another line on their already industrialized resumes. It was me and my first PhD student, Y, a shy, thoughtful introvert who, back then at least, looked up to me as something of a mentor.
We were sharing this motel room, the kind saturated with the stale, unmistakable aroma of dog piss, not necessarily out of camaraderie, but due to the university's stinginess, long before I could afford the modest comforts offered later at a Swedish institution.
The sessions had been suitably tedious. We knew we needed a drink; what we didn’t know was when to stop. Hours slid past midnight, sobriety fading behind us, when my former student (he was no longer working with me) suddenly turned and asked softly, using the gentle Turkish “hocam”, an honorific or friendly salute depending on the occasion, “Can I choose the next song?”
“Sure,” I replied. He put on Echoes. We lay on separate beds, eyes glued to a ceiling inexplicably set adrift, shimmering in the half-light. I moved to the laptop, compelled to watch the accompanying clip. Y joined me, delivering the kind of hug that only drunk people understand, heavy with sincerity. “I really love you,” he whispered.
Don’t hold your breath for salacious details—we were both straight, the declaration a rare acknowledgment of a love few find the courage to voice, let alone hold.
That was the first true listening, and it echoed forward to my listening a few days ago.
That sound—the ping. One single note, simple, unassuming, clear as a beacon. Nothing loud or melodramatic. Just suddenly, inexplicably present. And in that instant, so was I. Pulled abruptly from the drift, surprised to discover how deeply absent I'd been lately.
When the lyrics came, they were unpretentious, disarmingly straightforward:
“Strangers passing in the street / By chance two separate glances meet / And I am you and what I see is me.”
It landed hard. Not merely the notion of recognizing another, but that fleeting moment when you catch a reflection of your hidden self. That elusive, almost-forgotten impulse to reencounter yourself. The self you misplaced along the way, or perhaps had yet to truly confront without flinching.
Because Echoes itself is precisely this: a patient, deliberate effort at connection. It stretches carefully across distances, across noise, threading through all those parts we set aside in order to function. It doesn't rush. It gathers slowly, then disperses into dissonance—a vast landscape of loneliness, of unspoken truths, of bodies vibrating with everything unsaid.
Yet, missing parts return. Quietly, without fanfare, they reassemble themselves. Sometimes to hurt you, sometimes to offer a glimmer of hope, sometimes to just remind themselves.
“And no one sings me lullabies / And no one makes me close my eyes / So I throw the windows wide / And call to you across the sky.”
I’ve replayed that finale endlessly. Not because it consoles, but because it acknowledges me in a way few things do. And it does so without performance, without likes or follows, without the exhausting display of being seen. Simply… recognized. By myself. A nod of quiet agreement, acknowledging my presence within that fragile space between silence and speech, that intimate echo chamber within.
This isn’t a review. It isn’t tribute either. It's just a quiet, necessary gratitude.
Gratitude to the song that rediscovered me precisely when I'd misplaced myself. Gratitude for reminding me that true connection isn't merely about reaching another person.
Sometimes, it’s simply about remembering you're still here, reaching out across your own distances. If you're indeed still here. And if you can.
* Photo credit: “Flashback: David Gilmour Plays an Epic ‘Echoes’ in 2006,” by Andy Greene, Rolling Stone, November 4, 2014.
Encouraging. You.