Stranger in a Strange Land. It's a famous Sci-Fi novel written by Robert Heinlein. I've never read it, but I understand that it tells the story of a boy born on Mars, raised by Martians, now living on planet Earth.
And why does this title resonate so deeply. Doesn't this predicament ring so true? Don't we all feel like aliens? Born into a world that is not our own? Alienated from society, family, country, planet? A being separated and lost. Adrift in a foreign environment.
Yesterday it dawned on me that this "strange land," is also our bodies. We are beings trapped in muscle and bone. "Are these really my hands? Is this really my face? What is this odd vehicle in which I find myself encased?"
And this "me" or "I" - it is some kind of alien too. We are a strangeness doubly realized.