Through a Glass, Darkly

There are two men outside my office window, painting it white.  We are literally only a foot apart.  Here I am, in my office, on my computer, reading an article on Planar Laser Induced Fluorescence.  There they are, precariously perched on the pressurized gas tanks, scraping away flaking paint.  If it wasn't for the window, I could reach out and touch them.  If it wasn't for the window, we would feel obligated to talk to each other, strangers thrown into such close quarters.  However, one single pane of glass delineates the world outside from the world within.  They concentrate on their work and I concentrate on mine.

Looking through that window, I see the beautiful bright spring green trees.  I hear the sound of them talking quietly, comfortably, to each other in their work.  I can imagine how the spring humid air feels and I wish, wish, wish I could be outside.  I suddenly long to spend a day painting windows.

One of them gives me a smile.  I smile back.

Perhaps this window, which prevented us from spoken communication, allowed us to get a glimpse of another life, another world.

The men move on from their work, taking their ladders and their paint brushes and buckets with them.  I finish reading the article and move on to other things.

And though nothing is really quite different, nothing is really quite the same.

1 Corinthians 13:12 "For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known."