Perfect Moment: Inner city nights

The television screen shuts down, suddenly the room goes dark. I put the remote next to me, bed it somewhere in the cozy cover that I am wrapped into. I made this blanket myself, back in Kentucky, too many moons ago. It smells like daisies and detergent.

I get up and walk to the window, I open it to the width of a chink and the night spills inside. Its smells, its noises - they linger around and envelop the sleepy me. I open the window wider and take a deep breath.

Nothing is as perfect as night.

The city is dark and thus it is calm and clean.

The sky is bewilderingly black. Where does it begin and where does it end? It seems lifeless and my eyes have nothing to focus on. There are no stars at all, occasionally I spot a plane. A quiet, tiny plane - gliding across the dark, empty canvas, leaving an invisible line.

In the cathedral’s yard two stories below me, I hear voices. There are always voices. Chatting, shouting and laughing. Sometimes there is yelling and its echo backfires, ear-piercingly. I hear that, somewhere out there, kitchen staff is cleaning dirty dishes at restaurants and cutlery screeches across plates. I hear heels clicking on the cobblestone and running. And there is always music.

There is life. But from up here, I see no faces.

I take a deep breath. The warm air that brushes my naked arms - it smells like raspberries and fire. Like hot pavement and gasoline, meat and mushrooms, like beer and perfume.

I take another deep breath and the warm air fills my lungs fully. It smells like metal and fabric and wood, like sweat and roses. And like old backyards.

It smells perfect. So different from country air. It smells sweet and tense and compact and… just right. I close my eyes and try to capture it somehow. I wish I could store it away, this perfect moment. To keep my eyes closed forever and just surrender to the sounds and smells of the inner city at night.