budding scholar

No buildings, only squares of light on an inky black canvas night out the window just now. Dripping rain, splattering on the already-sleek courtyard. A siren headed up the street towards the hospital a few blocks away. I stand and take the photo through the open window, click. Holding tight so my phone doesn’t fall 7 stories to the ground.

Thinking about how stories begin, and end, like this. Details against a canvas of night, sounds echoing against ears, a patchwork of lighted windows. A remembered, or forgotten, twist in the story of a house, a neighborhood, a year, a life.  Light, dark, lights on dark. And then?

I’ve been thinking about seeing, but not really seeing things, how this can happen more in a city. The buildings are unchanging, and there are a lot of them, and I have somewhere to be. I’m lost in my head and my to-do list and worrying over my project. The other day I picked up my professor and her family at the airport, and one of the first things she said when we got into town was “I love all the wrought iron balconies”. And I said, “me  too”, and then thought to myself, “have I ever really noticed them?”. And I hadn’t. Not really. Today, I stood on a corner, looking up at the iron balconies of the building across the street above my metro stop. Really seeing them for the first time. How they stood out against the dull gray stone building. How they only started on the second or third floor level, above the trees. How different buildings swirl and wrap their iron in different ways. How my day, my project, my to-do list felt more tangible and possible once I forgot about it for a few moments.

What did you see, or (not) see, today?