The Decimal Spaces Of Life
More than just a place?
To preface — *waves around* — all of this, here is the dictionary definition of ‘Liminal Spaces’:
“In Internet aesthetics, liminal spaces are empty or abandoned places that appear eerie, forlorn, and often surreal. Liminal spaces are commonly places of transition, pertaining to the concept of liminality.”
I was actually unaware of the concept of liminal spaces up until around a year back, when I stumbled onto a subreddit called r/LiminalSpace and got super curious.
Initially, I completely dismissed the idea since every post was a snapshot of an empty street, an empty gas station, an empty room and such.
But slowly, I noticed that they all had something in common and no it’s not emptiness. What was common was this almost phantom, terribly hard to explain feeling of melancholy.
It was melancholy and a whole platter of other things. It was both a feeling of loss and whats-to-come, of the unease of emptiness, of longing and also of peace. More than that, not all of these posts were about empty things — there were posts about brightly lit, sterile hospital waiting rooms, or oddly proportioned swimming pools with the water drained.
It’s not fear, it’s not nostalgia, it’s not anticipation, and it’s definitely not familiarity. It’s all of these and none of these. Not only that, but it’s also not fear, not rational, not supernatural and definitely not easily explainable.
Also, once you have the eye for noticing liminal spaces — they seem to be everywhere. This is partly due to another weird thing called apophenia, but not entirely. Liminal spaces can very well move beyond a place to a time to a feeling and to a state of mind itself.
One of the scarier experiences I had as a kid happened on my — uhh — 14th birthday.
It was my 14th birthday and 2 of my close friends dragged my introvert behind to this mall. So I went and the next 3–4 hours were a lot of fun — we watched a movie, we had burgers, it was a good time.
So it was getting late in the night, around 10 pm, and all of us being wee 14-year-olds collectively decided that it was a good idea to inform our parents to pick us up.
Now I don’t quite recall what exactly happened next — I think both of my friends got a cab and skedaddled away — but I do remember that it was close to 12 and my dad was coming to pick me up and my dad was stuck in traffic, it was a weekday, and I was at the mall, alone and slightly creeped out.
I was told to stay near the main doors until my dad got there, but I sorta wandered around the mall. But me being my can’t stop won’t stop-self decided to just explore.
I still remember how it felt. I felt this strange sense of loneliness that’s hard to put into words. It felt like I was both very, very alone and not. I could hear the squeak of mops, the clatter of cutlery, the whoosh of a vacuum — but I never saw an actual person.
It was like these objects were being telepathically controlled by the mall itself — like the mall was a being.
This weird mall experience is one of many such where the lack of people, especially in larger spaces, leaves me with a very distinct type of discomfort.
AND THIS STARTED HAPPENING ONLY AFTER I KNEW WHAT LIMINAL SPACES WERE!!!
And that the sense of just nothingness is what I associate liminal spaces with. A space that’s between a 1 — not empty and a -1 — void.
Some places, like the mall are never meant to be just completely empty. These are the swimming pools, the airports, the schools — these are places that are supposed to always have people scampering around in them.
When you think of an empty airport, you think of an airport with no passengers. When you think of an empty school, you think of a school with no students and no teachers. And when you think of an empty pool, you think of a pool with no swimmers and perfectly still water.
But these empty places aren’t really empty, now are they?
An airport without passengers will still have those scary security dudes, the customer service people and just sweepers and cleaners. A school without students and teachers will also have some admin staff lurking around and the occasional outside guest. Similarly, a pool without swimmers will have a lifeguard on duty, maintenance personnel performing routine checks, and perhaps a few individuals overseeing facility operations.
Hell, screw humans. An empty airport, school or pool will still have running water, steady electricity and maintenance systems in place.
But pure emptiness, the kind that creeps me the fuck out — that’s different,
That emptiness is much harder to bring about.
What’s the difference between an abandoned home and an empty house? Logically they are the same thing, they are a place of living with no one living inside. And yet, an abandoned home has so much more of a story than just another empty house.
They are both empty — but not empty in the same way.
From empty classrooms to empty shopping malls to empty swimming pools, all of us have experienced this strangely strange feeling where something feels off. But what are liminal spaces exactly?
Well, the Google definition of liminal is ‘occupying a position at, or on both sides of, a boundary or threshold’. But I feel like this definition is just woefully inadequate.
Because, to me, liminal spaces are often empty spaces. And yet, most empty spaces are not liminal.
Last month, while returning home from work, I left my phone charger at the office. So I moaned a bit and groaned a bit and finally forced myself to go back and get it. I left around 4 pm — that’s when everyone leaves, and I went back around 6. So by the time I got there, the cubicles were dark, and everything was clean and shiny. This, to me, isn’t a liminal space.
It’s just empty.
If the definition of liminal is spaces in transition, then there are entire chunks of our lives that could be considered as liminal spaces.
From the days of our youth filled with acne to our first job, first love, and first real loss, everything is transitional.
We, simply by our nature, are in a constant state of change. Constantly abandoning our past selves and changing, in small or not small ways.
In this light, this constant sense of discomfort and feeling like a square peg in a round hole makes so much bloody sense.
And it can be more than that, screw one individual, let us consider entire communities.
Communities have to deal with this deep sense of liminality and discomfort as they navigate from being prejudiced to something resembling equality.
Speaking of navigating, COVID might have kinda passed us over. But the effects are still there. And what’s still there is this sense of change. A change that has happened and is happening slowly, slightly but on a worldwide scale.
This is also a liminal space.
People craning their heads over like swans trying to pinpoint which weirdo keeps sneezing in public is a liminal space.
People feeling out of place and out of time is a liminal space.
So it’s fairly easy to stop thinking of liminal spaces as weird pockets of emptiness, but rather a pocket of change and the discomfort that comes with it.
It can be anything from a person finally letting go of their crazy teen self and becoming a responsible adult to the strange, will they-won’t they, transitional parts of a relationship to grief letting go and transitioning into acceptance.
Alright, let’s think of the virtual world now.
I adore video games, not only because they are one of my favorite forms of entertainment, but also because games create communities like nothing else.
And while there is always a fraction of these communities that’s toxic and repulsive, it’s also so, so easy to make new friendships and create connections.
But online spaces can have this strange form of emptiness. It’s probably because of the anonymous nature, and probably because online interactions lack the physical presence and tangible connection found in face-to-face interactions.
Last night I was in a discord call with 4 other people I have gamed with for months, some even years. They are, by definition, my friends. And yet, I know barely a thing about them.
This paradox, where online communities both feel so warmly inviting and strangely empty at once, feels like a liminal space.
Because so many of these online interactions always seem like they are one day far from turning into actual friendships, but never getting there.
Think too hard about this, and you end up questioning our concept of friendships altogether.
But getting back on the topic of liminality, I think a lot of online spaces can be compared to a concert hall 4 hours after a concert has finished. Remnants of the activity linger — chairs askew, lights dimmed — but the space feels eerily empty, a few stragglers the only sign of life.
It’s as if they’re perpetually stuck in this in-between state.
And lastly, let’s discuss working from home. If there ever was an online space that feels just hollow, it’s all of those team meetings and conferences that happen.
Now, this is not about the client meetings, the deadlines, or the project updates. I am referring to the internal, often dubbed “team building” meetings that feel so goddamn awkward and forced.
These are nothing but strange, empty and unnatural spaces where people feel uncomfortable and inauthentic. This creates a liminal space.
Because the people you work daily with, should be your friends. But that isn’t happening, now, is it?
This essay is a bit of a mess. I get that.
But liminal spaces, scratch that, liminality is a very interesting concept and so much more than empty rooms and empty pools.
Liminal spaces are those things, but they are also a lot of other things. Liminal spaces are both the in-between and the null, they represent not just absence but rather absence with reverberating echoes of presence.
Liminal spaces feel empty, yet they are imbued with the ghosts of what was or what could be.
But more than that, to me, liminality represents a lot of things. A lot of things that are often contradictory. Liminal spaces can both be the crossroads where decisions are made, the anticipation of something new, the unease of letting go, the thrill of the uncertain and the shrouded, confined opportunity of it all.
It can be every single of these and none of these.
Originally published at https://thehumaning.substack.com.
