We left after the Fajr prayer, seeking some activity for our bodies and some rest for our souls, so we headed to the swimming pool. We stayed there for about an hour, swimming and engaging in this exercise which I consider one of the most beautiful and beneficial physical activities; because it does not move just one single part of the body, but rather stirs the whole body, combining the vigor of movement with the pleasure of water, and effort with relaxation all at once. Click Here To Follow Our WhatsApp Channel
We then returned from the pool, and I sat down to my work, occupied with it until noon. This was typical of the days I spend while traveling; for travel, despite all its movement and change, does not excuse a person from their work, nor does it allow them to completely abandon their intellectual and scholarly habits. Rather, it changes their location, while keeping for them their own self and the routines they are accustomed to.
At one o’clock, my student Muhammad Aqib came to me, and his arrival was a source of comfort after hours of preoccupation and work. He stayed with us for about three hours, during which we spoke about various things, relating to knowledge, literature, and life, as well as the thoughts and experiences one encounters during travels. Perhaps the most delightful aspect of a teacher’s meeting with his student is that the conversation is not confined to knowledge alone; knowledge is merely a door, and beyond that door lies a vast life, many experiences, and endless memories.
I read to him some poetry of Sheikh Sa’di Shirazi from his book Bustan. How often one finds in Sa’di’s poetry wisdom that time does not diminish nor do days wear out! He was a poet who lived in an era different from ours, saw a world different from what we see, and spoke a language different from our daily vernacular. Yet, when you read him, you feel as if you are listening to a man who knows the human heart intimately, and understands its weakness and strength, its sorrow and joy, in a way that does not change with the changing of ages and places.
At four, we bade farewell to Aqib, who was returning to Canada that evening. The farewell appeared simple on the surface, as most farewell moments do, but it leaves a trace in the soul that soon emerges when one is alone with oneself. Friends, students, and colleagues pass through our lives and then part from us, yet some of them never leave the heart, even if they leave the place.
After Aqib left, I and Ma’az set out for Woodstock, a small town in Virginia, located just outside Washington, in the heart of the Shenandoah Valley, amidst those mountains that stretch across this part of the country, bestowing upon it a quiet beauty that needs neither much adornment nor many words. It is a small town, with a population of fewer than six thousand, dating back to the late eighteenth century, yet its small size has not prevented it from being today a place where the tranquility of the countryside and the beauty of nature converge.
I did not know that this short trip would leave an imprint on my soul unlike that of passing journeys.
For there, we rode in a hot-air balloon, and there was a touch of adventure in it that I was not used to. I will not hide that as I approached boarding, I felt a bit of fear; for a person feels secure on the ground as long as they stand upon it, and when they intend to leave it, it first appears as if it is a departure from the familiar norm they have known since childhood. Perhaps this is the secret of that fear which seizes a person when they try to rise just a little above the earth.
Then the balloon began to ascend. It rose slowly, as if the earth did not want to let go of us all at once. In just moments, I saw things changing before my eyes. The earth was near, then it gradually began to recede. The houses that had seemed large became small, the roads that had stretched before us appeared like lines drawn by a child on a vast page, and the fields that we see from the ground as separate patches became, from above, a single canvas where colors and shapes intermingled.
The most remarkable thing about this ride was its quietness. There was no roar of an engine to spoil the soul’s clarity, nor speed to distract from contemplation. Rather, the balloon carried us through the air with a strange serenity, until one could imagine that the sky was carrying us gently, and that the wind was not pushing us, but rather taking us by the hand to wherever Allah willed for us to reach.
I looked down at the fields below me, and they stretched far away, some green, some leaning towards yellow, with narrow roads and scattered farms between them. I saw the villages as small clusters of houses nestled in the lap of nature, and saw the houses from above as something different from what we are accustomed to when walking along the roads. What appeared from the ground as a grand building became, from the sky, a tiny dot, and what seemed to separate one house from another appeared close and connected.
I saw the animals in the farms moving on the ground, tiny in our eyes, but alive, moving and shifting, as if reminding a person that life does not stop because we have risen above it. We were looking down at the earth from above, and they, in their small world, were going about their business, unconcerned with the wonder and contemplation we were experiencing.
As for the mountains, they had a different presence. They stretched across the horizon in majestic silence, as if they were as ancient as the earth itself, indifferent to humanity and what it does, to what brings it joy today and forgets tomorrow. Green covered them, and the evening light descended upon them gradually, until some appeared near, and others seemed to dissolve into the horizon.
I stood gazing at them for a long time, and felt that when a person sees such beauty, they cannot remain preoccupied with themselves for long. Nature, in some of its moments, leaves no room for arrogance; for it reminds a person of their true size, and says to them in its silence what words cannot express.
The sun had begun to incline towards sunset, casting a gentle golden light over the earth. Things no longer retained their original colors; the houses, fields, trees, mountains, and roads all took on a single hue of tranquility and beauty. The scene from above the balloon was more like a picture that a person cannot capture in a book, but rather captures in their memory.
In that moment, I felt that I was not looking at Virginia alone, but at the entire earth with different eyes. When a person lives on the earth, they see only the part they walk on, the road they take, the house they live in, and the city they work in. But when they rise a little, they see things all together, and see the connections between them. They see the road from where the traveler cannot see it, the house from where its inhabitant cannot see it, and the village from where its people cannot see it.
Perhaps this is one of life’s lessons. How many matters do we think are great because we are close to them, but when we step back a little, they appear small and limited! How many worries fill the heart because their bearer sees them only from within, but if they step outside and look at them from afar, they realize they were not worth all that anxiety!
The balloon was ascending, and the earth was shrinking, but something else was happening inside me: some of the things that had weighed heavily on my heart were also becoming smaller.
Ma’az was by my side, and his presence was part of the beauty of this journey. In such moments, a person does not need much talk; it is enough to have someone beside you to share the scene, and to turn to them and see in their eyes some of the wonder you feel yourself. Some memories are not made by place alone, but by the place, the person, and the moment all together.
The ride continued, and I was between fear that had vanished, wonder that remained, and a serenity that began to settle in the soul. I felt suspended between earth and sky, and that this short distance separating me from the ground had given me the opportunity to see something of the beauty of Allah’s creation that I had never seen before.
It was not merely a fleeting pleasure for me; there was a deeper meaning in it. A person sometimes needs to step out of the place from which they are accustomed to seeing things, so that they may truly know them. Perhaps the most beneficial journeys are those that change our way of seeing before they change the place we live in.
Then the balloon began to descend. I felt a pang of sorrow; I wished the ride could have lasted a little longer, that the sun could have remained on the horizon a little longer, and that the mountains, fields, and houses could have stayed beneath us in this image I had never seen before.
But everything has an end. We landed on the earth, and the earth which had been frightening to ascend from at first became a place we yearned to return to. Such is the human soul: it fears a thing before knowing it, and when it knows it, it becomes familiar with it, and then grieves when it parts from it.
I returned to the earth, but I did not return to it as I had left it. Something of that evening remained in the soul: the image of the mountains remained, the sprawling fields remained, the small houses remained, the animals moving peacefully remained, the sun pouring its final light upon the valley remained, and that strange feeling remained—that the world we live in every day can appear new to us if we change our angle of looking at it.
Some journeys remain in memory more than entire cities do. It was a short journey in the sky, but it was a long one in the soul.
When night came, we got into the car at half past eight heading back to Washington. The road lights had begun to appear, the day had ended, and nothing remained of Woodstock but the memories of the scenes we had taken with us. We stopped along the way at a place where we had a light dinner. Food after a day of movement and travel tasted better than at other times, and perhaps a person does not know the value of small things until they come after exertion.
We continued on our way. The night had settled, and the road stretched before us in quietness, and I was thinking about a day that began with water and ended with the road, and between them passed a meeting with a student, reading poetry, a trip to a small town, and then an ascent into the sky.
We arrived at the apartment at quarter past ten at night. The day was over, but its impact was not.
I began my day with water, where the body moves and regains its vigor, then I sat to my work, then met my student, so conversation, knowledge, and literature had their share of the day. Then I went out with Ma’az to Woodstock, and found myself in the sky looking at the earth from afar.
Perhaps the most beautiful thing that remains with me from this day is not the image of the balloon, nor the image of the mountains, nor the image of the fields, nor the sunset alone; but rather that feeling that overcame me while suspended between earth and sky: the feeling of a person being a small part of a vast universe, and that they must, however much life occupies them with its duties and worries, sometimes raise their head to see the sky, and sometimes look at the earth from afar, so that they do not forget that beyond what they are accustomed to every day lies a vast world of beauty and grandeur.
And this, I think, was the most beautiful gift this evening bestowed upon me. An evening short in the reckoning of hours, long in the reckoning of memory.
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