Eiji Ohashi

Once, as I was standing in front of a closed railroad crossing, I found myself in thought.
Railroad crossings are places that exist anywhere. They are places where everyone has at least once stopped in their tracks.
The gate descends; the warning bell sounds. In this town at Japan’s northernmost tip, a town without even traffic lights, the only place I stopped at all was the railroad crossing. I think back to my childhood, and I hear the strangely peaceful sounds of a railroad crossing. I can still see the images in my memory today.
Railroad tracks let me think of carefree holidays, but also of life itself. Whenever we stop for a moment during the long course of our lives, we take a look back on days that have gone by, or look forward to what may lie ahead.
For me, railroad crossings are tied closely to my memories; they are Pandora’s Boxes filled with the past. The word ‘crossing’ suggests a kind of interchange. In my view, railroad crossings are places where our lives overlap.
They are places where people’s memories cross and intersect.