There she was, standing on the roof, towering over the entire sleepless city. The cold concrete buildings encased the unforgiving glass windows which concealed all those peering, judgemental eyes that scanned this way and that looking for the next dollar to seize up. The aging industrial steel beams interlocking one with the other held up the toiling lives of the workers who craved the duties that they performed daily just to gain a piece of paper with a number on it. It was such a calculated trap that they all fell into, some realizing, some not knowing at all. She deeply inhaled the thin air on the rooftop and noted that as the wind whipped her loose hair strands across her face there was a sense of sadness and empowerment floating along the current.
She peered over at the building two blocks up and over one more and reminisced about what it was like when she took over that firm. She remembered how a middle-aged woman had gotten down on her knees and begged to keep her job when she fired everyone. It was pitiful, really. She heard the echoes of this woman's sobs explaining how she had three children to feed and her husband had died from cancer the year before, leaving her nothing but medical debts. But that had nothing to do with her and it was not her problem. There was money to be made and no middle-aged woman was going to stand in her way. After all, she didn't want to end up in a situation like that woman. And she had worked her ass off to get to where she was.
She turned, bored of the tragic memories in that building, and looked up several blocks to a beautifully ornate building, the one with all the magnificent statues in the courtyard. Again, she found herself tarrying in memories of the past as she observed this fantastic structure. She remembered the man who, upon finding out that the building had been purchased and was going to be turned into a new business, had fallen to his knees and suffered a mild heart attack. He should have cut the salt in his diet about twenty years earlier and taken up lunch break power walks like the rest of the team on his floor had. That was not her fault, she chimed in on her own thoughts. "I mean, he was considerably overweight and always over-stressed.", she added to her misconceived thoughts. Better that he ended up in a care facility the way he did in his state of being, anyway.
She shook of those dusty old thoughts and walked over to the other side of the building. From here she could see the smaller iconic building that once showcased a waterfall at it's entry, but was replaced with a rock climbing wall when she purchased the building and changed it from a child care center to an indoor sports enthusiast's adventureland with astronomical membership prices. People work hard and so they deserved a nice place to play and enjoy their hard-earned money. Maybe if more people took advantage of her sporty wonderland they wouldn't end up with so much cancer or heart attacks. She was doing her part, but she couldn't force anyone to be healthy. Of course, that single father who used to drop his toddler off at the child care center she closed, the only one he could afford and the only one he could get to in time in the mornings that coincided with his demanding work schedule, that man probably would still be stressed out. She saw the look of desperation in his eyes when he pleaded with her not to close down the daycare center and gave an account of all the tragic reasons why he needed that place. "Ugh!", she thought. "Pathetic."
She continued surveying the cityscape and making mental notes of all the financial victories she had attained. And along with each victory, she noted each supposed tragedy, each calamity that rippled out because of her success. She comforted herself with the notion that she could only be responsible for her own actions and she consoled herself further with the delusion that she wasn't breaking any laws or doing anything illegal. She, in her very dogmatic mind, was a fine, upstanding citizen of this city and it was because of her and people like her that commerce and cash flow existed here. In fact, she had a paramount role to play in the success of this city. She was legendary, she cited to herself. And with that, she turned her back to the entire city and returned back inside to her ludicrous and extravagant prosperity.
Unbenounced to her, far below her within the city beyond any place that her infinite view would expose, beyond any point that her luxurious penthouse would perceive, was a widowed mother of three, who bent over a single plate of food that was to be divided up among her younglings. She said a simple prayer over the food and included a wish for the rich woman that she ,too, would know for herself true riches like the ones that she had sitting at the table with her now; these little ones who loved her so much that even their tummies would be full from the overflow of their hearts.
A little further up the alley was an old man in a care facility who made greeting cards in his spare time with encouraging messages of hope for those who fell ill or needed a little pick-me-up. With each card he sold, he donated a percent to a program at the local indoor sports center for children who were crippled so that they could play and climb and have adventures with the other children with the assistance of specially trained staff members. He had hoped that the woman who bought the building and put in the sports center would be inclined to stop by sometime and see the joy that these children experienced because of the program that she allowed to operate within her facility. He hoped that she would live a long, healthy and full life knowing that these children benefitted, even when others were faced with detriment because of her decisions.
And even further away still, there was a man with a small child who was collecting cans and bottles so that he would have enough money to buy a pair of shoes for his fast-growing son. He struggled to keep his chin up and wondered what fate would deal for him today, but nevertheless, he was determined to not let his little one see the stressful concerns he was faced with. Any time his son would look up at him and question if something was wrong, he would smile down at his munchkin and say, "I am only sad for the woman who closed your daycare because she doesn't have any children of her own to ask her if anything is wrong." In response to this, the child would say, "Then I will send all my love to her today, too, because she needs it. I hope she feels my love, daddy. Just like I send my love to mommy in heaven." The father could only smile and shed a single tear. "I'm sure she will feel your love, my son, because as it is above, so it is below, and as it is within, so it is without, and as the universe, so the soul."
