‘Private’
A wrought iron gate cordons off a small and somewhat mysterious flight of stone stairs in the Tower of London.
The sign spells out the obvious.
It’s a classier warning sign than the one I featured in the recent post No Admittance, but amounts to the same thing really.
The bars pictured here are signifiers of more than privacy – they emphatically spell isolation.
The Tower, in bygone times, was home to many prisoners, who I suspect had way more privacy than they would have liked…
Window, Tower of London October 2019
We all want to be seen to be broad minded and to be the one to take the wider perspective.
This shot of a window in the Tower of London (a prison to many unfortunates centuries ago) gives a little lie to that virtue.
For there is a time to take the narrow view.
When it is the only view.
When you are in darkness, or a jail of circumstances beyond your control.
Then the sliver of light and the merest glimpse of the exterior is enough to give hope.
Some small positivity, manageable to a damaged spirit.
The whole luminescent world of possibility is too much to contemplate in that grim time.
If you are there, as I have undoubtedly been, it’s okay to do only what you can and take the narrow view…
Awesome caged chandelier light in the foyer of my workplace.
A design of opposites.
Light, imprisoned.
Chains and their shadows cast by luminescence.
This seems to be some sort of interior design thing at the moment, but to me it symbolises the great universal struggle.
Truth and freedom versus lies and subjugation .
It probably is just a light , Andy ,I tell myself – but I will climb the stairs to the office and deal with the legal problems besetting our clients and which are small examples of the big struggle.
And it will be time to try to shine a little light on things…
“Why do you stay in prison, when the door is so wide open?”
– Rumi
Last night I was watching a rerun of the movie ‘The Terminal’, starring Tom Hanks. His character is from a fictional republic in the former Soviet Union and he lands at New York ,but because of a revolution at home he is rendered stateless and thus unable to leave the airport terminal .He has a personal mission he must achieve in NY ,but when he is “gifted” a small envelope of time by the immigration authorities to walk out to America ,while they turn a blind eye , he hesitates at the doors ,and cannot exit, held back by fears.
The scene Rumi’s words above . All of us have at some time been held captive by fear and doubt, often of our own making. When the chance to escape comes, are we courageous enough to do so, or will we languish in our all too familiar cell?
Ebb Then Flood 