Stories Collected While Living in France

French la Vie

Meeting at the Window Between Here and There

Woman sitting by the window Corey Amaro

 

 

 

Walking along a street I saw an older woman sitting by a window. If it hadn't been for the brown worn shutters, and the white sheer curtain that framed her face… I would not have seen the small shadow of a person peering out.

 

 

Woman sitting by the window Corey Amaro 

 

Aiming my lens at the second floor I hoped to capture the stillness of the scene, the age, the solemn color, the moment. The woman by the window didn't sit still…she moved in and out of the shadow of the curtain. I held my camera and waited.

 

 

Woman-sitting-by-the-window 

 

While I was focusing my camera on her silhouette, she turned around and looked directly at me. Her eye and my eye caught each other inside the lens. Instead of taking her picture, I lowered my camera and sheepishly smiled at her, then I held my hand up, sort of as a wave and an apology. Her eyes sparkled as she smiled back, and I knew she didn't mind. I wanted to ring her doorbell and run up the stairs to meet her.

Instead, I walked down the street, carrying the image of her smiling at me. What a lovely image to have.

At that moment, in our silent exchange, I felt like we met. Have you ever felt like that? A chance meeting between two people where something goes beyond words, time or activity, and you know you have shared another space and time together?

Comments

19 responses to “Meeting at the Window Between Here and There”

  1. g

    Yes I have had that happen a few times- and the entire exchange(s) stays with me even till now-every detail shadow smile etc…I wonder what it is….

    Reply
  2. melly

    At the end of March, in 2014, as I met with my mother’s attending physician in an opened sitting area, what I thought was a daily update, I was devastated to hear the words coming out of his mouth. I broke to pieces unable to contain the pain. The doctor casually walked away, immunized from the effect of his words, which without doubt he had delivered hundreds of times.
    I sobbed into my hands trying to hide my face from those around me going about their day. When I could finally uncover my face, the figure of an elderly man whose door was open on the opposite corridor, across from the nurses main station, was looking at me as he sat on the side of his bed…I could not make out his face due to the light behind him shadowing his features. He raised his hand pointing directly at me. Took his index finger and ran it down his face in a crying gesture. He folded his arms across his chest in a hug rocking slowly side to side and pointed back at me. My buckling knees could not carry me across the hall to thank him and there was nothing that could add to this magical moment we had just shared. I will never know who he was and I hope that the love and comfort he gave me that day was bestowed upon him many times. A moment I will never forget.

    Reply
  3. Shelley

    Divine.Simply Divine.

    Reply
  4. Ali

    The kindness of strangers….
    Ali

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  5. French la Vie

    How beautiful. xxx

    Reply
  6. Jeanne

    Always greet with a smile that is where love begins.
    How beautiful are all of your postings
    Love Jeanne

    Reply
  7. Momof5

    Yes but it did not end with a smile. While visiting my daughter in college in ohio with a large population of Amish I snapped a picture of a family in a buggy stopped in front of us at a red light. I thought I would capture a sweet scene of the backs of the mother and father with their two young children seated between them. Just as I snapped the photo the mother turned around. So my photo was immortalized with the rightful glare of the mother. I know that the Amish do not like their photos taken but I thought I could do this and no one would be the wiser. My family was mortified, as was I when she caught me with my camera violating her and her family’s privacy. Lesson learned. I love your photos of the woman at the window and am happy you were met with a smile.

    Reply
  8. Ardi Butler

    I was in Rome some years ago with my three sisters. We were walking across the square to Trevi Fountain and way up, perhaps on the fourth floor of an old building, sat an old woman. Her window was open and she looked over the square. I was in the back of our group and I waved at her. She waved back. It was a lovely thing to happen.

    Reply
  9. g

    THIS IS SUCH A BEAUTIFUL HAPPENING IN SUCH A DARK MOMENT….I am rendered speechless!

    Reply
  10. Nikki

    Corey, many years ago while I was driving and turning a corner at a very busy intersection I had a similar experience. There was a man in a vehicle turning the other way and we met in the middle of the intersection. As we passed each other it was as if time stood still and all sound disappeared. We locked eyes with each other for what seemed like an eternity and then “poof” the moment was over and I was headed down the street. I was so shaken by the experience and had to pull over to collect my thoughts. It was as if our souls had recognized each other from another time and place. The moment is forever etched in my memory. Perhaps your lady was waiting by the window for someone to come up those stairs and say hello? I simply love your postings..

    Reply
  11. Patricia Lynch

    I love all these beautiful stories and yours, Corey for inspiring them. Life can be truly amazing.♥️

    Reply
  12. Tracy

    Melly, that is so powerful.

    Reply
  13. Carol

    Not with a stranger, but my father and I were listening to a beautiful music recording and we looked at each other and we both had tears in our eyes. We never said a word. No words needed.

    Reply
  14. Chico Sue

    Comfort without a word is often the most effective. How kind of him to offer it to you at a time most needed.

    Reply
  15. Debbie

    What a beautiful post. I have only had one thing happen that was similar. I was traveling with my two sisters on a train to Seattle many years ago. I was a married woman and there was a man who was with his wife and children. We shared a glance, nothing more, but it was if our souls briefly connected. I can’t explain it beyond that, but it is something I have never forgotten.

    Reply
  16. Patti

    What a beautiful gift

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  17. g

    That is incredible – and it stays –

    Reply
  18. Sue J.

    Melly – a beautiful and heartbreaking moment.

    Reply
  19. Jan

    Not a chance meeting, but an observation that still takes my breath away from the beauty of this moment between my father and my sister, six months after her accident. From a blogpost I wrote:
    “One beautiful, breezy, late summer [a Maine July] afternoon, I had the great honor of witnessing one of the most tender moments of my life. I had gone with my dad to visit Suzanne. She’d come out of her coma a few weeks before. Dad wheeled Suzanne outside [the hospital hallways] to enjoy the sunshine. I watched as my father lovingly tended to her as he sat facing her. He filed her fingernails as he spoke tenderly to her, calling her ‘Little Girl’. My sister was 36 y.o. and my father was calling her “Little Girl”. They looked into each other’s eyes as he spoke. Have you ever watched love electrically pass between the eyes of two people? This is what I witnessed. I could not speak, I could only observe. I felt suspended in air looking down on this scene. I then watched as my father carefully painted Sue’s fingernails. My father, the Colonel, was painting my sister’s fingernails. Gently, tenderly, he swept the brush across her nails. Tears streamed down my face. My eyes water at the memory. It was at this moment I felt the enormity and fullness of God’s love. I saw Jesus, and he was painting Suzanne’s fingernails.”
    It’s a moment I will never forget.

    Reply

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