Sims Echo Park

When I was driving home today I was stopped at a light watching a phalanx of people trotting across the intersection. An old guy, a pregnant woman pushing a stroller, three women in office attire, a fat guy wearing a too-short shirt and pajama bottoms (I suspect he was an escapee from the hospital on the corner), two students with backpacks, and several men and women running for the local bus. Quite the collection. I could hear their conversation, but since I was in the truck I couldn't make out the words; it sounded like the nonsense sounds the Sims make.
   Then it hit me. Maybe they really were Sims. Maybe I was a Sim. Maybe the words I was speaking, thinking, and writing made no more sense than the gibberish the Sims used. Maybe I only thought I understood myself because my delusion was internally consistent. Like dream logic that makes perfect sense in the moment but doesn't stand up to scrutiny when you're awake.
   Thoroughly freaked out, I drove on when the light changed. Did I think in pictograms that only some at-a-distance observer could see? Was my existence a figment, and only in-progress when some person started a program? Was I just a copy of some piece of code, trapped somewhere in a larger algorithm?
   Then I realized that I was starting to think I was in the movie Tron. Or maybe the Matrix. Probably Tron because that's way cooler, and they're coming out with a sequel next year.
   But that brief two-block episode did bring me back to my college days and discussions in philosophy class. How do we know what's real? How do we know that we are experiencing what we think we are?
   I honestly don't remember the answers to any of that. Probably there aren't answers. But I would say that if I can sit behind the wheel of my truck and have a brief solipsistic crisis, then I have too much time on my hands. The fact of the matter is, real or imagined, there are other people in the world, and it's connections with those other people that matter the most. Any one of those people crossing the intersection this afternoon might have made a great friend. Or a terrible enemy. Or maybe they just had an interesting story to tell, or a tragic one, or an hilarious one. Thing is, I'll never know because I had the windows rolled up.
   I need to fix this. I need to get out more.