Ants Marching

What to do...what to do...

I took a break today from my study routine. I hadn't realized how fast i was spinning till i got gizzy, and stopped. I had started taking steps towards the exam that would give me a license to practice architecture, and had since been storming through so many books (and what feels like just about as many languages). But through it all, i am happy. The long awaited time for me to be on my own and doing things for myself has come, i've arrived at Barcelona.

As i walked through one of subways, i found myself being carried by the current of people gushing through the underground tunnels that connect one train to another, that bring them above or under ground. They were like ants marching, they all had to be somewhere at some point in time, doing something. My mind(the only thing capable of stoping in the middle of all the rush)paused for a minute and i asked myself, "Whats the rush?" It seems everyone is in such a hurry to get somewhere everyday; that place, that activity we identify ourselves with, spend most of our lives at. "What is it about big cities?" many people ask. "I could never live in a place that moves so fast", said many of my friends back in Mallorca. And there, being carried along by the current, i was riding on the answer.

The most beautiful thing about cities is how moves. Everyone always has something to do some place, to contribute to something.

It is fast. Tomorrow is too far away and ten minutes is plenty of time.

It is the stage for new things, trial and error, trial, and more trial until something great is achieved.

Dirty, clean, rich, poor, the most beautiful and the ugliest.

It is a playgound of ideas, and opportunities.

I walked through that subway alongside an asian, african, european, american, a mother, a child, a student, a businessman, catholics, hindus, muslims, a lady with a bike, a man playing an instrument and singing and we all passed.

I look at what i did today and i wonder why i am so bored, and it is so hard for me not to be doing anything, and then i realize the answer to my friends' question of why i would want to live in a city.

I feel alive. I see the blood that rushes through the arteries that are its streets, and side walks, and flow into the very centers that make it move, that makes its heart beat. It beats so loud you can almost not hear your own.

I am a child, in a playground of possibilities. With all that playing, i will lose breath, fall to the ground, cut myself, hope to God not to dont break a bone. But it will make me that much stronger. Meanwhile, i run, i jump, i walk, i stop to catch my breath only to do it all again the next day.