Midweek, one ordinary early evening, I watched people shuffling across the street moments after being set-free from their train ride home, from a busy city where they work doing a range of things: technical, in law, banking, construction, in art and fashion…

 

In a time we are all uncertain—

 

In high-up places, and downtown, they buzz through the streets in cabs, by foot, on schedule—the clock ticking dollar bills. Between the hours of twelve and two some break for lunch, and sit with a sandwich or fruit by a fountain, enjoy daydreams until once again they return home to our seaside town.

 

The aroma of plum tomato and garlic calls to them from the local pizzeria, as they hurriedly make the green light, cross the street to meet their cars patiently waiting at meters (calculating quarters for the hours they’ve been gone). Others walk home or get a ride. A cabdriver anxiously calls-out to make a living.

 

The streets intertwine like stories and ghosts that we hear on a subconscious level, of years past and days ahead that hold us willingly captive, in love with this city—our home.

 

This particular evening the sky could not decide whether to storm or let the sun shine for its final hours before setting, and it cast-off a mystical greyish-pink hue. Photographers and artists would surely gather on the boardwalk to capture a pre-dusk—hope not to be forgotten—before evening’s ominous newscast.

 

Salt was heavy in the air from a rough surf, and the light-fog swayed like a slow dance, romancing.

 

I turned right at the corner and slowly drove toward the ocean, peace in her waves, on my mind.

 

As an extra-sensory being absorbs everything going on around them like their own movement—I notice most people are asleep or too busy inside themselves to notice the energy around them—until I see Diana.

 

Diana owns a lady’s handbag and accessory store with her mother, a seamstress and bag designer, on the main strip. The boutique is filled with more than fashion trends for her clients, but rather creative details that if you listen tell a story.

 

Pocketbooks upon the shelves, leather and embroidery, fall and summer necessities, earrings in a case of glass with silver trim. —A mirror with a delicate woman’s image.

 

She’ll greet you each time with a beautiful smile and in it you can see her dreams.

 

She didn’t notice me as I recognized her walking—a poem unfolding on a page.

 

I was glad not to interrupt the momentum of her stride. It struck me as being accompanied by song. Indeed flowing as opposed to walking. Her gaze was faraway and reminiscent of youthful innocence. A breeze gently influenced her auburn hair.

 

I watched intently as it seemed she was unaffected by the ordinary surrounding her—traffic, a bicyclist carrying a food delivery, but was captured with the extraordinary—a seagull with dinner in its beak about to land on the edge of a broken fence, as if it were Heaven.

 

I felt less lonely seeing a kindred soul watching, as I do, the world around us.

 

It became understood that not everyone on a Wednesday could be a butterfly or a ballad. Some must be a traffic light or a steal gate. Some are meant to be foundation, solid to land upon, while others fill the air with wonder; and there are those that are meant to notice and call attention to each.

 

In light and in darkness, in times of woe or of joy, confidence or uncertainty – we are all individual movement, our own beat, each a separate story none less important, different by cultures, and yet the same by design.

 

This is our home by the sea, among many different homes under the sky, where people travel to and fro, seeing and experiencing life around them—a rose about to bud—or a shattered piece of glass in mourning.

 

Tomorrow will be another story—each soul a particle in defining its entirety—like sand and a city by the sea.

 

Maria Pisciotta-DellaPorte ©2017 All Rights Reserved