How it feels being around all these old buildings

It is very surreal walking around Rome seeing all of the old buildings and architecture. The Coliseum was when it really hit me where we were walking. I never really thought about how old the buildings really are. At home I considered a home built in the 1800’s to be ancient. Then there I was standing inside of something built before Christ was born. All I could think about is the people that had walked in the same exact footsteps. People who I had read about in history books; famous rulers and artists. Looking out into the center of the Coliseum I tried to imagine what it was like; 75,000 people gathering together to watch what was happening in the arena. It is hard to grasp how different life was and that there were that many people in one place all getting there without cars or any motorized transportation.
The hardest thing being around these buildings and ruins is to try and imagine what it was like when they were first built. I never really realized that the buildings had marble on them and the words were not simply carved in but gold letters were inlayed. Looking at reconstructions of the buildings and how they were laid out gave me a much better picture in my head. Being in Rome makes me realize these are not just buildings they are pieces of living history that carry the stories from long ago.