More Than A Subway Station

A friend of mine posted this picture of the subway stop that we who attended Xavier High School used.
When I saw the photo, I was struck, immediately, by the flood of memories I had in remembering how many times I stood at that spot waiting for my train. Depending on the time of day that I was there, the station could be stangely quiet; almost catherdral like in it’s silence. It was at this station that many thoughts about my day at Xavier would run through my mind. It allowed me the time look back over the day, the week, the year, while I was trying to figure out where I had come from and where I was going to; for sifting through the things I had done and the things I had left undone; for a clue to who I was and who, for better or worse, I was becoming.
I remember being there, after a dance, late at night and being with a girl who lived in Woodside and she wanted to ride home on the subway with me! I never wanted the subway to arrive!
Today, I sometimes wish for a place to have these long thoughts.
Seeing this picture reminded me that there are, indeed, some locations where the past lives on as a part of the present, where the dead are alive again, where we are most alive ourselves and to reflect on where our journeys have brought us. A place, unchanged, where, if we close our eyes, with patience, with charity, with quietness of heart, we can remember consciously the lives we have lived.
And you guys thought it was just a picture of a subway stop!