Life In Transit: Living In The In-Between

Life is lived in the in-between

In transit

Between coming and going

Between staying and moving on

Between here and there

 

And what we call home

What we call settled or contented

Is merely a resting place

A station for refuelling

A nexus for re-connecting

A junction for changing direction

 

The bus stops and train stations

The airports and traffic lights of our life

Are nodes linking us to our past

And windows peering into our future

They are choice matrixes

And platforms of destiny

 

At life’s stopping points

We bump into others and smile

(Or curse silently under our breath)

We pause long enough to reflect

To mull on our confusion

And share moments of clarity

 

So let us not be so impatient to leave

To wish we were somewhere else

Because life’s most unexpected surprises

Happen in the in-between

In the moments of passing touch

And the tangled knots of transition

Between boredom and panic

In the zone of chance

When the landscape is not rushing by

 

And love (the greatest surprise of all)

Is only to be found where paths cross

And journeys are re-routed

Where our most fixed plans change

And new destinations are contemplated

Love is seldom found at high speed

When we are looking for obvious landmarks

But rather when we are standing still enough

To notice subtle shifts in moods and patterns

 

Life is lived in the in-between

Amidst strangers who become friends

And friends who become lovers

Amidst lovers who become soul mates

And soul mates who make life worth living

 

And the places we think of as our endpoints

Are just launch pads for new beginnings

The time we spend waiting for our lives to change

Is the very fulcrum on which our galaxies pivot

 

Therefore, let us pay attention to the waiting

And be alert in the places of transit

Let us soak up the chaotic ambience of where we are

Rather than pine for the neatly ordered vision

Of where we could or should or want to be

 

Let us be where we are

Noticing the people and the smells

And the noise of the jumbled waiting

Alert to the feelings and the flow

And the beauty of the to-ing and fro-ing

Content not to be where we think we are going

Nor where we imagine we came from

 

Let us be happily in the transit of now

Fascinated by the overlapping of our world with others’

Of precious moments shared

Of fleeting smiles and knowing looks

Of orbits crossing that almost certainly mean nothing

And yet might just mean everything

 

Let us acknowledge all the forgettable faces

That emerge from the fog and melt back into oblivion

The warmth offered by random strangers

That leave us certain of nothing

Except that nothing is certain

And knowing no one

(Not even ourselves)

And yet knowing many so intimately

Through these fleeting connections

 

Life is lived in the in-between

Between moving and minding

Between loving and doubting

Between you and me

In transit

Life is lived

In the in-between

 

 

Copyright 2007

 

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