Taking the last train out of the city in the evening sometimes feels like it really is the last ride.The passengers are tired and silent after a long day at work. Now that the darkness comes earlier, the windows show no scenery and instead reflect back images of the inside of the train. Only occasionally, when the train arrives at a station or crosses a road, do you see some points of light through the windows. Otherwise black dominates.
People doze off. At night, the train seems to travel quietly and slowly; nothing at all like the morning's imperative to arrive on time in the heart of the city.
Clackety-clack-clack. Only the muffled sound of the locomotive and the hum of the ventilator in the car. People sitting apart from each other, spread out evenly in the car, each person in their own space, wrapped in their own thoughts.
The train arrives at a station; again quietly, it seems. The conductor announces the stop. One or two people get off. The train slowly resumes its course.
I wonder if this will be the way after death, as we travel to a destination beyond. Will we also sit as silent strangers on that night train?
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Photo courtesy Egidio Bacigalupi, through the stock.xchng
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