Escaping Through a Window

Windows fascinate me in a strange sort of way. Like a fly to a light bulb, windows draw me in. Sometimes people walk into the room when I am looking through them and I find some excuse to be near that corner. Sometimes, windows are stained, geometrically shaped, or pictures made from different shapes and stains. I have never understood their true purpose; they let in light, but that is really their only practical use in the 21st century.

I remember once looking through a window for 10 hours straight. That particular window was not shaped like an octagon or stained bright colors. It was a plain, rectangular window. Maybe, it had curtains, but I don’t remember, probably because I was nine years old at the time. What did I remember about this one, simple window? This window took me away for 10 hours from the misery that filled the house I was trapped in.

That was the day my mother died. Unlike everyone in the house, I did not cry when I was told. Instead, I walked around the house and was drawn to the window, where I sat down and simply looked out. I watched everything: the wind blowing through the small trees, the cars going by on the main road, the neighbors outside mowing the grass and yelling when the mower ran out of gasoline, the sky turning orange and pink, then slowly fading to darkness. All of which seemed so beautiful to me.
When I turned from the window and looked around the room, all I saw was an empty living room and kitchen. The table was covered with those ridiculous meat platters that people buy when someone dies because for some reason, people think you forget how to cook over the course of a day or they can’t say, “I’m sorry” and they need to make some big gesture of feeding you. My mother usually occupied the kitchen, cooking Filipino dishes that would fill the room with their delicious smells. All I saw then was… emptiness and continued to look out my window, escaping to the outside the only way I was allowed to.

Some look at windows and think the ornate ones are the most beautiful, but I think different. It’s not what the windows look like that matters, it’s what you can see through them. I think that seeing beauty in simple things is the most important thing in life. Looking through a window, I can see the beauty of living. It makes me feel free in a strange sort of way. My body may be stuck in a room, doing some menial task, but I can see and think beyond my physical boundaries.