That Morning

I woke up that morning, startled by the sudden flash of brightness coming through the opening in the wall, the window, yes, the window, that beautiful hole in the wall that I never fully appreciated until just this moment when that brightness engulfed my room which was littered with dirty clothes, countless leftover bags of Funions and Doritos and Fritos, boxes of pizza, and enough bottles of water to get eight dollars at the recycling center, ah yes, the recycling center, with its familiar crunching and grinding of aluminum pop cans, the recycling center that I must visit, as well as the candy store with its many unrecognizable smells, the local opera with those beautiful voices that never had clear meaning, and the park, which I remembered was only a few feet from the outside of the window that I was gazing out, looking at the glorious trash in the street, the dogs running wild with no leashes or collars, the children playing in the street with no parents in sight, and the women selling their bodies to lonely men and undercover cops, and while viewing the violence, decadence, and malcontents, I couldn't help but think how beautiful it all was because up until that flash of light had woken me up that morning, I had never seen anything in my entire life, because up until that flash of light woke me up, I had been blind.

by Vince Tropea