Distance

In 2007 I lived outside of Frankfurt, in a town called Königstein. I had a beautiful house to myself, it was located near the woods, sort of nudged at the foot of a mountain and had this picture book view down onto the city of Frankfurt. Sometimes I would stay up at night and just take in the shimmering sparkling lights that seemed to hover above the buildings and scrapers. It would look like the city was not a city at all but a huge shiny animal, snoozing in the distance and from time to time it would breathe deeply in and out but otherwise be rather quiet. And you would hear its animal hum when the breeze was right.

It always gets me - that to many people cities are living things. And yes I am one of those... what romantics? I don't know.

In a way it seems obvious, banal even to say that a city is a living thing. Because OF COURSE it is. But when you think about it - what is it that breathes life into tons and tons of bricks and tarmac and cement and paint and wood and stone? Is it the people that live there? Does their energy rub off? How would that work?

People run a city, they make a city - or do they?

So if I drive out of town and bring some space between myself and the metropolis, then what do I see and feel?
Lights on in almost every house.
Is it a trick?

Could it be that what I feel when I look and listen closely is the sparks of millions of souls?