19 November 2024.

 19 November 2024.

Two parallel rail tracks stretched into the horizon, side by side but never touching. They had been laid down decades ago, at the same time, by the same hands. One track was slightly worn, its steel rails darkened by the years, while the other gleamed a little brighter, its surface still smooth from the recent passing of trains. They both watched the world go by: mountains, rivers, forests, and cities; always moving, always going forward. Like two forgotten thoughts.

Sometimes, a train would come and shake the earth beneath them, its headlights casting long shadows over the rails. For a moment, the world would seem to pause, as if everything was on the verge of something, anything, even a collision. But it passed, as it always did. The train, the night, the silence.

At night, when the trains were silent and the stars hung like soft lanterns above the earth, the two tracks would whisper to each other. They spoke of their journeys, of the places they had seen, and of the distant landscapes that stretched far beyond their reach. At night, when the moon was full and the world seemed to sleep, the tracks would lie there in the dark, aware of each other in a way that only things destined to never meet could understand. There was a kind of tenderness between them, a fragile, unspoken bond that only the wind and the dust could sense.

Sometimes, they wondered if they would ever meet. But deep down, they knew that they never would. It was not their fate. They were just there, together but not together, running in their own direction, heading toward futures that would never intersect. They had always known this.

In that stillness, they were enough. It was fine. It had always been fine.

And in the morning it happened. Some random guy pulled down his pants, squatted right in the middle of the tracks and took a dump.

19 Nov 2024. World Toilet Day.

Shit at home, asshole.