What I Saw

Life goes by fast. Sometimes so fast that we don't stop to engage the small things that scrape across our visual landscape. Some people thrive in the paradigm of ignorance being bliss.

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I don't.

I try to take note of the small things I encounter — deliberately, daily — because they enrich the experience of being alive in ways that nothing else can. It's the complex dynamic of humanity and the nature it contains that broadens your perspective. It gives you the ability to understand more, relate more, and appreciate something like compassion at a level most people never access.

I was on a business trip. A last-minute request from a client that required me to change my schedule abruptly and drive to Flagstaff for an emergency meeting. Most people would treat that like a standard inconvenience. I grabbed my camera. My goal is to make every event a potential memory worth sharing.

After my meeting, I saw an old barn. Worth stopping for. Then another weathered building. Another stop. By that point, I felt the day had given me enough — photos I could eventually share with the world.

Then the weather turned. Hail and rain descended on Flagstaff the way it does — sudden and indifferent. Time to head back to the Valley. I stopped for gas on my way out of town.

And as usual, I began to survey my surroundings. Camera within quick reach.

What I saw.

I saw a man sitting outside in weather that was not welcoming. His attention was lost somewhere far from that bench — he wasn't concerned with the cold or the rain pressing in around him. He wasn't concerned with societal norms as they relate to attire. I noticed the use of accessories for purpose, not posture. A pink backpack that probably belonged to someone else's child at some point. Layers not chosen for style but for survival.

I noticed a grievous and hopeless expression on his face. It spoke volumes about his current state — the kind of look that isn't performing sadness but is simply too exhausted to hide it anymore.

I saw a man whose life journey had placed him in a depressed and unmanageable state.

I saw a man who, for reasons unknown to me, had ventured into a social label that is often despised by the majority.

I saw a man with regret.

I saw a man without hope.

I saw a man who had given up on dreams.

I saw a man who desperately needed to be loved — at some point in his life, and even more so today.

I saw a man I had pity for. I saw a man whose life I would never wish on anyone. I saw a man who reflects on the outside what many of us feel on the inside.

I saw a man. A real man. A broken man.

But I only saw what was on the outside. Assumptions — with a probable level of accuracy whose validity I may never know. What I do know is this: showing him kindness and grace doesn't only benefit him temporarily. It's a mutual exchange. It grounds me in thanksgiving. It recalibrates what I think I'm owed. It forces me to confront the things I take for granted — the small things I don't value, the stimuli not worth becoming angry about, the comforts I treat as rights instead of gifts.

In that gas station parking lot, in the rain, I saw a glimpse of what makes life worth living. Relationships worth nurturing. Forgiveness worth asking for. And failures by others — not worth keeping.

That is what I saw.

What do you see?

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