A Red Light and a Golden Reminder

Working from home changes the way you experience the world. Days blur into each other. Mornings begin with log-ins and end with screen fatigue. Sometimes, life outside feels distant - muted behind windows, walls, and routines.

On weekends, when I finally get to unplug, I don’t want anything big. I just want to rest. Stillness. No appointments. Just watching a drama series or blasting music through my earphones while I do absolutely nothing. It’s not about being productive anymore. It’s about finally feeling like I can breathe.

That weekend, all I had to do was a quick grocery run. A small errand I’d been putting off, which I was supposed to do in the morning. I didn’t dress up. I didn’t plan. Just some grocery list I noted in my phone so I wouldn’t forget. I just needed to get it over with and come back home to my quiet corner of the world.

I was crossing the street when the pedestrian light turned red. I stopped. The traffic moved. I stood there, waiting for the light to change. I can’t even remember what I was thinking at the time - probably nothing at all. My mind was just quiet, maybe tired. And that’s when I looked up.

And there it was: the city glowing in the sunset.

The kind of light that doesn’t shout for your attention but wraps itself around buildings, soft and golden, like it’s trying to remind the city that beauty still exists…even here, even now. The chaos paused. Just for a breath. And so did I.

That moment felt strangely personal.

It reminded me how many things I’d missed lately. Not just sunsets…but moments. Little pockets of wonder like the kind you don’t plan for, but that quietly show up when life slows down for a second. The soft warmth of afternoon light, the stillness of your street, the way a stranger smiles at you without a reason. Also, the kind of kindness that’s easy to overlook when you’re always rushing - someone holding the door or simply being patient with yourself when you’re tired. I’d been caught up in deadlines, in digital noise, in the pressure to keep moving. To stay productive. To get it right.

And in all that…. I’d missed myself.
Not in a loud or dramatic way, but in the quiet way where you stop noticing how tired you’ve become. Where you forget what it feels like to simply be, without performing, chasing success, or rushing. I’d been present, but not really here.

We all go through seasons of misses. The job we didn’t land. The dream that faded. The timing that never quite worked out. The relationships that frayed. The version of life we thought we’d have by now. Miss after miss piles up until you start to feel like you’re stuck beneath it all…buried under the mess of trying, failing, starting over, and pretending everything’s fine.

But that sunset? It didn’t care what I’d missed. It showed up anyway.

In that unexpected pause at the red light, I realized something: there’s still life beneath the mess. Still light. Still something worth pausing for. And maybe we don’t need to chase those moments. Maybe they find us in between everything else… when we’re not rushing, not proving, not performing. Just being.

Because after all the failures, the wrong turns, the almosts, and the could-have-beens….there's still beauty. Not in perfection, but in persistence. The city doesn’t stop for anyone, but the sunset doesn’t need it to. It shows up anyway, wrapping the brokenness in light, proving that beauty doesn’t wait for things to be perfect.

And maybe that’s the point.

Maybe the mess isn’t something to escape, but something to live through. To grow from.
Maybe the misses - those missed opportunities, missed signs, missed chances, they were just part of the unfolding. They hurt, yes, but they shaped us. And here we are, still standing, still breathing, still watching the sky catch fire one more time.

A city sunset reminds us that healing doesn’t always look like silence and solitude. Sometimes, it’s a deep breath on a crowded sidewalk, a brief pause in a packed train, or the way sunlight dances off a skyscraper. It’s hope…. quiet, resilient, and stubborn as ever.

So, the next time the sky turns gold above the city’s gray, take a moment. Let the light spill into the cracks of your day, your week, your life. Because beneath the mess, after all the misses, there’s still you - whole, human, and worthy of every sunset still to come. - MESSY E.

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