Sitting Still, Miles Away

Do you ever notice the people who do not travel?

Not the ones who cannot.

The ones who do not want to.

While conversations fill the room with plans,

routes, and dates,

they are already seated somewhere quiet,

not on a map,

but within themselves.

You will find them in the corner of a café,

a book open, untouched for long minutes,

coffee cooling beside it.

Time does not chase them there.

If nothing interrupts, they could sit for hours.

Days, even.

Sometimes they choose a window.

They do not watch the sky for drama.

They let it change.

Blue to grey. Grey to rain.

And whatever comes, comes.

At times their eyes drift into the crowd,

not searching for faces,

only letting thoughts pass through,

like clear water slipping between pebbles,

never trying to stay.

Other times they lie still beneath a blanket,

unwilling to ask the day what hour it has become.

Outside, the world moves,

inside, everything rests.

Look into their eyes.

They might be deeper than the trench you once went scuba diving in.

Listen to their breath.

It might be calmer than the breeze you felt

high up in the mountain valleys last year.

They are okay with silence.

Not the forced kind.

The honest kind.

For them, peace is not waiting

at the end of a highway

or hidden in some faraway place.

Peace can be small.

An old book with pages that smell like time.

A cigarette slowly burning itself out by the window.

Smoke rising, disappearing,

as if it was never meant to stay.

A phone held loosely,

scrolling without intention,

searching for nothing in particular,

maybe just the last colour they remember loving.

No rush.

No plans.

No urgency to arrive.

Just stillness.

And the quiet freedom of choosing not to move.

And honestly,

that is enough.

A sunset seen from a mountain far away

is not more sacred

than the warm yellow light

falling softly on the table where they sit.

The silence of wide valleys

does not outweigh

the silence of the corner they have chosen.

That is their journey.

They are not lazy.

They are not afraid.

They are not missing out.

They exist.

And they know it.

Maybe they are remembering someone they once loved.

Maybe they are trying to forget.

Maybe they travel to their past and return quietly.

Maybe they have gone too far into the future

and come back tired,

tired in ways words refuse to explain.

They may look still from the outside.

But their mind,

oh, it wanders.

It moves through the music in their earphones,

like a small boat on waters

you would be afraid to sit in.

Their pain may be deeper

than the cliffs where people pause to take photos,

holding railings, smiling carefully.

Their eyes may have already reached a horizon

where someone was let go for the last time,

while others were busy choosing destinations.

They travel.

Through memories.

Through thoughts.

Through moments that return without warning.

They travel inward.

Where no tickets are needed.

Where no photographs exist.

So let them be.

Let them sit.

Let them stay.

Do not tease them for not going places.

Some journeys do not show on maps.

Some distances cannot be measured.

Some people arrive without ever leaving.

But We may never see it.

They may never say it.

But it is real.

Respect.

And love.