The colors were so compelling that we felt no other compulsion but to run towards the light. Or toward finding the source of the light. It had to get better if we got closer. Obvious, of course, because all humans seem to feel the pull towards a good sunset. And this is who we were. ‘Who we are.
What’s objectively comical here is that we were running as if we were reliving our kid years. Moving at top speed– not necessarily because there was anything objective at the end of our sprint, but rather, running as fast as you can just to see what’s in the tank. The run felt like that kind of moment.
And we are now well old enough to know that these kinds of moments are in short and unpredictable supply. To wit, I had been sitting inside the house, watching with anxious awareness that the world outside was suddenly really different. Really beautiful. My heart was sinking because I knew that this sunset would be special. Nothing like the pleasant but underwhelming event that was the sundown on December 31st. Yet on that day, I suddenly knew that I was in the process of missing something big. Perhaps not important, but definitely big.
“Come on, we’re going.”
This was the voice I suddenly heard above me. A voice tumbling down the stairs with a clip that moved just as fast as his feet. His jacket was half on, the other arm working to make its way into the other sleeve.
No need to explain, I sprang up off the couch and found my sneakers. The kind that are kind of slip on, kind of in need of typing. The kind I have found that are always in need of a double knot. But there’s no time for that step. The light outside is shifting. But it’s still great. There’s still time to get to the beach.
And so we get outside and mutually agree to break into a run: full-grown adults currently banging around the 50-year-old person’s tether pole. As a child playing out in the street, if I’d seen the two of us clopping by, I’d have thought that there was a fire or something. Old people in everyday clothes aren’t exactly known for such spontaneous activity without a serious reason. But that light. I can’t tell you how attractive it was. Magical is an overused word so I won’t use it.
It’s only about 1000 meters before we can get to the water’s edge, but it feels longer. We run in silence. All is quiet now, because it is end of day. And then, I feel my right sneaker coming unlaced. These shoes. I stop for nothing and instead continue, wondering and hoping that the shoe will stand on my foot. As an adult I know that the stakes are not so high, but that thinking is overruled by the idea that there is no time for us to stop and fix my shoe. The light and the clouds are continuing to shift. And tomorrow, who knows what the sky will have in store?
When we do get to the beach, we are breathing heavily but are in no way in need of an oxygen tank. Not like the one that the corpsman used to keep on the pier whenever the crew of our ship had to perform the twice-yearly running test. Not for us. We two sailors were at least a bit ahead.
As we left the road and turned onto the sandy passageway, it was only a matter of moments before my untied shoe shifted duties and turned to a sand collector. The beach in this part of Italy is not the best– it is simply too close to the Tevere and sadly washes up a fair bit of plastic and who knows what else. But this wasn’t on our minds. Neither was the sand in my shoe. Instead, it was the vivid pinks. And as we made our way to the shoreline, we saw that we were far from the only ones who had shown up for the spectacle.
There are moments like this one when I am reminded of the famous poem by Heaney, the one where he says, Useless to think you’ll park and capture it More thoroughly. He was right, although he got damn close to succeeding. All of us at the beach had our phones out. Tapping photos into our phone in lieu of pressing shutters before stopping to look again, confirming that the pink we’d captured was not an illusion or a misinterpretation by our phone. It really was that magic.
A number of years ago I got as a gag gift this collection of “Adult Accomplishment Stickers”. Fashioned after the ones we used to receive in the elementary school classroom, they say things like, “Today I wore a bra!” or “I prepared and ate a salad!”. Basically a testament to just getting through the day in a more or less upright fashion. On this weekend, I had finally managed to file my taxes– an accomplishment that isn’t on the whole momentous, but felt like a load off for me. And so even before this Sunday sunset, I was already feeling light. Light enough to run fast and see something inconsequential. The fading day felt easeful and better than any other form of carefree escapism.
I suppose I could have summed this entire story up by just saying, “This weekend, I went out to watch the sunset”. Many of us do this every day. Or maybe we see it while we are driving– only a passing glance and thought to register, “ah it’s a nice one tonight.” I probably could have saved a reader some time. But I’m an adult, and the older that I get, the more enchanted I become by the bullshit free moments that are there for the taking…of course if we have the spare moment to do so. It is useless to think that we capture these moments of beauty with any perfection but on the whole, I believe it’s more than worthwhile to at least try. Tied shoes or not.