The Almost Hit lives on the outskirts of memory; it’s there, alongside the “greats,” but it is not regarded as one of them. It’s not a rival, not viral, not a victim of the hordes of tourists who tirelessly snap photos. The Almost Hit doesn’t receive millions of likes on Instagram or Facebook, nor does it have thousands of followers on Twitter. It doesn’t appear on our phone screens. No one travels the world to visit it, there are no flight deals to see it, it’s not a postcard, and no one hangs it in their living room.
The Almost Hit lives close to that fleeting glory, hiding from daily covers and never appearing in magazines; it has never been the protagonist. It is a hero of time, though no one remembers it. It doesn’t appear in the collective imagination and doesn’t have a place on the list of goals. It’s not printed in the album of our emotions.
The Almost Hit is so close and yet so far. It’s not exhausted by the pursuit of recognition, it doesn’t suffer from the anxiety to stand out. It simply exists, enduring through time, floating without pretension. It’s suspended, so invisible, so silent, so subtle, that it feels foreign to us. Yet, over it, we leave the traces of our daily lives, our inaudible thoughts, our renewed desires, unresolved worries, and sincere joys.
The ocean is crossed, mountains are climbed, the skies are traversed, and the future is staked, just to press a button, share the image, and get likes that turn the Hit viral. It’s a constant race to collect space, a space buried under the need to capture prestige, a space that has been emptied of what it once gave, and whose only wish was to BE.
Barcelona is the third most photographed city in the world, according to Sightsmap.com. In 2015, its concrete carried the footsteps and fantasies of over eight million tourists. Gaudí, Picasso, Salvador Dalí, Miró, and Lionel Messi are the protagonists of this bucolic frenzy. La Sagrada Familia, Park Güell, the Gothic Quarter, El Born, Las Ramblas, among others, have become the Hits that fuel the eternal desire of eyes to observe and applaud the success of those who became who they wanted to be.
Perhaps, contemplating the deaf and intangible beauty of the places we walk through daily, reality urges us to simply recognize the magnificent simplicity of our lives, to say goodbye to the constant pretensions that motivate us and invite us to turn existence into a Hit, in which, maybe, just maybe, we’d rather be an Almost Hit.
