SOMEHOW, I always feel an air of sadness whenever I am inside any bus terminal, pier, train station, or airport. The endless parade of people headed somewhere adds deeper meaning to this strange sensation.
It doesn’t even really matter whether I know these travelers are either coming or leaving home. The obvious purpose of these portals is as plain as it is somber. While people go about their own journeys and adventures, you know, there are always those who will be left alone at the platform. Once, during my younger years, I saw myself as that person.
I haven’t been a stranger to travel. Itchy feet, my mother once called me. This is why whenever a family member or close friend embarked on a journey, I could totally relate to their excitement or growing anticipation of a coming trip ahead, which to me was really an adventure of sorts.
In my younger days, I had once adhered to the call of “a rolling stone gathers no moss,” living for a while as a rambling musician.
Through those years, while I roved and gaped, breathed and lived in the wide world outside my hometown, the airports and provincial stations, terminals and ports have all become jumbled up into a blur of black and white frames.
And because my focus then was on the social relationships I had with people and companions, those terminals eventually turned into nothing but stark structures that I’ve often ignored. The journey, not the destination, then, had become the main thing, and in the lingo of the time, the trip.
A favorite daydream I remember was, whenever I took a bus trip or train ride, I’d look out the window as houses along the highway zipped past, and imagine choosing a house at random, then fantasizing myself as living there in total anonymity, lost from the world.
That had been a long time ago. Now, whenever I am inside such buildings, I somehow re-live the old feel and imagine that these may be new people coming in every day, but hail to the ancient structure, it hasn’t changed a bit.
I’m also imagining many among the travelers that may have passed through its doors have gone from younglings to professionals while being patrons of the place. As always, because things remain the same, people will be standing in line patiently waiting for their buses, while nearby, there will be those who’ll be left standing at the platform to send them off.
In the end, the quick zips from point A to B have already lost a bit it’s spell on me. Even though I still recall my once-favorite seat in the non-stop buses of long ago, it’s fine by me that they’re now enjoyed by others.
As it is, our younger son drives us on our trips, from visits to relatives or to many other forays I still think of as adventures. Because of this, terminals have become a thing of the past for me. However, I still dream of them, as I would other old haunts. But only as a fond reminder that the road and the journey never really end.
