When I first moved into my apartment I hated the train. I was bitter about my circumstances and I’d give it the finger every time it roared past. Then one late afternoon, I was sitting outside while on the phone with my dad. We paused our conversation while the train when by.
“Fucking train,” I grumbled.
My dad at that time was just about to begin chemotherapy. In his simple, no bullshit way, he told me to get my head out of my ass and appreciate it for what it was: an honest life. Security, he told me, doesn’t come from living in a large house on the other side of the tracks. “Better to live where you are with the truth,” he said, “then to live over there with a pack of lies.”
And he was right, even if it took me a long time to finally make peace with it.
While I don’t love the train the way I used to, I don’t hate it anymore either. I don’t lift my middle finger and face it to the wall whenever it passes. I do however, look out my bedroom window every morning and see this. It’s not pretty, but it’s honest and I have my dad to thank for the revelation.
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