Miles apart

Back without puns. Took me 4 years.

Imagine growing apart. Imagine you are physically there, but your thoughts wander somewhere else. Now imagine yourself still pretending that nothing is broken. You’re subconsciously maintaining the illusion of trust and candor. It has long become an automation, a mere chore your body obliges to perform, all governed by your dulled mind not even grasping the consequences. You lie. It doesn’t matter as it’s all part of the same farcical ploy set in motion long before you’ve lost touch with yourself.

So you play along. Teetering on the edge lost its meaning as a phrase as you push things past the brink many times over. There’s a fog clouding your judgement. You wish to live but fail to see that if there’s anyone who impeded your noble efforts, it was you. You think that you’re running in circles whereas your sliding down a spiral. And that’s miles apart from where you were a few years back.

I’m not sure if this picture was taken 2, 3, or 4 years ago. There’s a spot right atop one of the two hills of Fonyód: a rare opening in the hedge that lets you peek down below. It’s not an immense vertical drop – in fact, there’s rarely anything grandiose about the landscape. At the end of the day, though, it’s all about the memories, isn’t it? It can be the most mundane place on the face of the earth yet you cherish is like no one else can or does. Have I seen prettier slopes? Definitely. Have I witnessed more dazzling sunsets and sunrises? Sure. And yet there’s hardly anything that compares to the moment when you reach the top, and finally stop to marvel at the almost even surface of the lake stretching across the land.

It is summer. It has to be. There are a handful of fishing structures scattered a few hundred meters from the shore – these are rarely in use. Most folks who fish pick a pier or sit on the coast. Not this time, though: a lone, stooping figure catches my attention, holding a fishing rod in their hand. The lake’s surface is brightly lit, the reflection is almost blinding. This is one of those rare f/16 1/1000 moments. I want drastic contrast and almost zero colors. A constant battle of dark ripples and bright tips. The whole pattern should only be broken by a single object: the lone bench with whoever is sitting on it. I want you to glance at it and think: oh well, this is another case of a wide shot of a repetitive pattern. And then you should spot it. And once you did, you can start over and read the first two paragraphs again.