Walking among shadows

So often it seems as if we know other people only as shadows.

Some people, like the most casual of acquaintances, we may know as sketches, outlines.

But then there are a whole lot of people who we encounter through life who are more than just sketches but less than three-dimensional, almost a little less than flesh-and-blood to us. People who are like shadows, having shape and definition, but so leaving so much unknown between the edges of the outline. We sense there is more - we know there is - but how do we move beyond this?

Does it take a crisis for a shadow to take on dimension? Or is colour and depth added over cups of coffee, short conversations around the water cooler, bumping into each other at a party where you only have each other for security and company?

I suppose it begs the question: who are you a shadow to?