We went to Chattanooga one weekend in September 2007 to visit Scott's grandmother. In the evening, we took a walk downtown. At dusk, we saw thousands of starlings take to the sky. At first, it was just a couple large flocks, and then more and more of them came together to become this huge mass. They were swirling and swooping through the sky and it was just amazing.
Seeing this awesome sight really made me think.
To start off with, it made me reconsider how I feel about starlings. To see these little birds often thought of as dirty, little winged rats flying in formation in the sky made them suddenly seem gentle, fluid, almost elegant.
And second, it made me realize just how wrapped up in our lives we can be. As Scott, Lucas and I stood and watched thousands of little black birds ebb and flow through the sky, people around us were oblivious. Walking in groups down the street to various destinations, fiddling with iPods and cell phones, doing all they could not to look around them and be forced to make eye contact with anyone else. People in cars, adjusting stereos, primping at stoplights, waiting on traffic. All while something absolutely beautiful was going on, if they'd only look up to see it. If they'd only taken a break from trying to tune the world out, they'd have seen something breathtaking.
But being the only three people who noticed this did something else for me. It made the moment even more beautiful and precious. The world was busily moving on about the three of us, while we paused to let it pass by as we looked up into a dark, dancing cloud of birds.
There's something beautiful happening every second, everywhere. Please don't forget to take a moment to stop and savor it.
