Wonders of Thresholds
I have a very different story for you today, dear readers. A brief story about thresholds and their beautiful variety. From crossing a doorway to the sensation accompanying trespassing. From the space around people to the things you can and can't say to them. There's more physical sensations too, like walking into the invigorating cacophony of a dance club or that dark alley you'd be a fool to enter. Thresholds are fascinating to me, they can get so ephemeral they sometimes feel like a trick of your senses. Sometimes you can't just quite pin why something feels off, or good. Like being weirdly attracted by that tree, sleeping in moonlight as if the surrounding concrete and steel was never there. Or that moment where you're walking back home and you really want to take a different road this time, without knowing why. Well, I'm here to talk about the strange kind. The kind that you can never be sure was real. Next to my favorite coffee shop there's a beautiful old building. I think it used to be a textile mill. Old, repurposed a dozen time and stunningly adorned with various tags and throw ups. I was walking the same pace, the same path. Looking at the walls and the ongoing war for recognition painted on it. For some reason I stopped this time. The wall had a doorway that was condemned with concrete. A smooth grey, alien to the orange geometry surrounding it. That slab was just as covered with the human nature to express one's existence as the rest of it. But it was beautiful in a way I never saw before. The space that once was, covered in the expression of the souls that want to be. It's use changed again and again. I stared at it, considering the many ways humanity still continues to use it. Like it's begging to be crossed again, daring us with potential. Before I knew it, I was reaching for the door that isn't. The beauty of it's meaning and messages drawing me in. The stories it tells, stretching before my time and for long after. The people that this threshold has touched. I barely realized I was holding my breath. I swallowed as my digits approached the surreal surface. I took a step forward, this moment extending beyond measure. I leaned in and my heart skipped a beat as the surface I expected was nowhere to be found. I was falling, I closed my eyes and gasped for air. Then a blink, I was smiling, the soft gray grit kissing my palm. It's cold jarring against my blood rushed skin. The noises around me barely breaking through the rhythm of my racing heart. Before me was nothing but a wall. I was left with nothing but a crazed heart and an equally affected mind. Had I escaped a fate unbecoming of this world? Had I failed to cross into something more? Now I'm thinking I just got swept by a simple trick of the senses. The feeling of standing breathless in front of that threshold lingers. Maybe it's enough that it felt real.











