(I wrote this several years ago, when a blog was a mere pipedream)
I had already made my way to the door as the train ground to a halt, eager to get home to my family…
There had been a fire on another train at the central station and the platform had been closed. It was Friday and I had knocked off earlier, but seeing the unusually large crowd hovering on the bridge, I realized something was amiss. I walked towards the crowd and was peering down the stairs at the yellow-jacketed man who was obviously there to stop people going onto the platform, when a boy, around ten years old, said “Excuse me,” out of nowhere and without a word from me proceeded to tell me in great detail what had happened. My first thought was: brave of him to talk to strangers like that; my second thought, more info in 30 seconds than the railway gives in three hours. I decided to take my chances getting the tram to the city limits, where (very) sporadically buses travel to my home town. Worst case, I can walk it, I thought. Take a good hour but I can be alone with my thoughts. During the tram ride, I overheard that the trains were running from the final tram stop, much to my relief. Just like me that, to think of stoically walking home in the milky dusk rather than thinking of the train.
One large crush of irritated commuters later, I found myself before the sliding doors, ready to disembark…
Fortunately, I looked up as I stepped onto the platform. What greeted my eyes (and what my iPhone recorded poorly for posterity) was breathtaking. On earth the dull and busy hum of the evening commute home, the anticipation of the weekend, car headlights and the dull greys of diminishing daylight. But in the heavens: pink cotton candy clouds, row upon row in tidy luminescent furrows, not casting light upon the earth but glowing for their own sakes, tinged with orange towards the east, a memory of the sun. In between and bordered by fading blue, ever so gradually becoming turquoise at the horizon, daytime’s last farewell.
I paused, briefly an island in a river of people. Has anyone else seen this? Heads down, clutching their precious cargoes or tapping away, “I’ll be home in x minutes,” on their smartphones.
It struck me: this moment of beauty could be anywhere in the world. Far above what would separate us—borders, age, race, status etc.—nature paints a masterpiece, a riot of saturated color, for every eye to see. Without fanfare, without a countdown, without alerts or notifications—blink, and it’s gone.
For the one who raises their eyes: I am lifted above the ordinariness of our strivings by a transcendent, raging beauty—caught up in a higher eternal truth. I become aware of my insignificance in the universe but far from the chill of fear, I feel the liberating warmth of participation. By no means is this a selfish experience—for I realize that I, we, all humanity is marked by this beauty. We are its reflection. It is around us, inside us, indifferent of background or biography, hidden in plain sight but for the eyes of the one seeking it; and for this one, full of purpose.
My heart was humbled by the pink glow of dusk, it’s majesty and it’s depth. I became a bit more attuned to beauty and the eternal truths it hides. And I am a better person because of it.
