◉ 061 | Before the sound

The game

just finished.

Croatia

is

out.

I was

a raving football fan

as a kid.

Ok,

a raving

TV fan.

I watched

maybe

a dozen games

in different stadiums.

But being there,

I loved the flares

more than the game.

There was

a real force

in that

pink-red flame.

And thick smoke

as an afterthought.

Something

primal.

But the biggest

flare spectacle

I witnessed

wasn’t in a stadium.

It was

in an open-pit mine.

Dad worked

at Dalmacija Cement.

He took me

with him

that day.

We were sitting

on his running bulldozer

at a safe distance.

Half a dozen trucks

with a million lights

were zooming around

setting up

the no-go zone.

“The miners

used two tons

of explosives

today.”

“We used to use

twelve tons

back in the day,

when fewer people

lived around

the pit,”

said Dad.

My heart

was hammering.

First,

thick white smoke

rolled out

of the mountain.

Violent

pink-red flames

shot through.

Massive boulders

were flying silently

in the air

as if in slow motion.

The shockwave

crunched

my body.

Only then,

I heard

a massive explosion.

That was the day

I learned

the difference

between the speed

of light

and the speed

of sound

just by pure observation.

Much easier

to comprehend

than learning it

from books.