There is a small road bridge in
the park near where I stay. Due to the nature of its location – right in the
middle of two large, beautiful sections of the park – the bridge carries a
fascinating and bizarre range of characters.
Walking on this bridge, you might see an
old man, reciting Christian verses into a broken loud speaker, whilst clutching
a battered Bible in his withering hands. He might be followed by a young mother
who carries her offspring to school in a cane seat, fitted to the back of an old
cycle. From the other side of the bridge, a pale girl, staring into some vast
space in the future, might walk past in slow steps as her large St Bernard runs
ahead, chasing some unseen toy full of doggy joy.
If you are really lucky, this
series of characters might go past you in the exact order described above,
transporting you into the sets of a spontaneous film running parallel to your
daily life.
But don’t worry if this doesn’t
happen. The road bridge offers several other exciting opportunities for a
temporary escape from your present state of being. For below this bridge, lies
a railway track.
An old sign states the name of a
disused station and a little station house stands guard above this sign – a private and forbidding place - as though holding
up a banner that says ‘Sorry, we are now closed’.
However, these are merely signs
of deception for every once in a while, a train does pass these tracks.
This train is freight- only. It has
no windows, carries mysterious goods, and changes colour from dark brown to
dirty yellow depending on the mood you are in. Some might even call it forgettable.
But one summer evening
– and now
we are talking a transcendental form of luck – you, might be walking alone on
the bridge.
The trees around might be shaking
with the wind. You might not see a soul in sight. A flag behind you hitting its flag pole might
sound like three wind chimes, playing together to create the subtlest of sweet
sounding disharmonies. In that brief moment, that you exist in this strange and
timeless space, the dark brown/dirty yellow freight train might decide to go through
the disused station, below the very bridge you are standing on.
Now that we both know what that
moment feels like, perhaps we could use various sources of information, chart
out the timetable for this mystical train’s appearance, fill our flasks with some
tea, pack some biscuits, sit down on the bridge, legs dangling, and wait.
But in our breathlessness and our
over-excitement, I suspect we would lose any chance at all of experiencing that
intense moment of absolute and uninterrupted peace that we felt before. For how could the old
train possibly satisfy us, when we hold so many expectations of it?
It might be better then, to not
expect anything at all, and just dream of seeing the train again. Maybe then, it might
come along, in the way that an old friend sometimes crosses your way - a pleasant surprise.
Then as the wind chimes away around
your friend and you, you sit down together and say nothing,
absorbing each moment of that time shared, into your memory, feeling a sort of
sad - happiness to be in that timeless moment, knowing you will be
apart soon but not wanting to waste any time thinking about it.
For when you are finally out of luck and the
fascinating characters are all gone, at least you still have that memory and then you could dream of the possibility that the dark brown/dirty yellow freight
train, might chug away below the bridge you are on, once again.