Back to the real world, or so it is as I perceive it . . . .

So much to do and so much free time that I do not want to use toward getting it all done. Yet I am not bothered by this. I want to just slow time down and live in this moment forever. This moment. Not one any later than now.

I have experienced too many times the joy of one moment only to find that I have shattered it and ended up on the wrong side of it, miserable. Perhaps there is joy in the utter realization of those moments, as well. In fact, I know that there is. I just want to be here, to live here, right now. I never want to be on the other side of this, to have this only exist in a memory. To remember only the loss of this, as Faulkner would say, is a reality that I will have to face. I wish that I could properly immortalize this moment as Dante did with his visions. I will attempt to do this.

I feel tha warmth of my laptop on my thighs, and the chill of the air on my toes, although the comforter is covering them. My false nails are clicking arhythmically on the keyboard. Some version of Law and Order is on television, and Bruce Springsteen's special has just ended with an energizing and cathartic version of "Born to Run." I have almost all of the lights on in the living room where I half sit, half-lie on the couch. However, the apartment is dark and cozy, in spite of all this. My husband sits contentedly in his chair, reading a 1995 issue of Guitar World Magazine. He occasionally looks up and tells me about an interesting bit of an article about which he has been reminded through his new perusal of this magazine. Kenn's trunk that holds the hundreds of magazines collected over the years stands open, next to the trap set of drums, with his tobacco-burst Music Man bass guitar propped backwards against the wall, under the small, narrow window. In the far corner, an older, gaudy, gold-speckled drumset is stacked next to a modified amp and a huge speaker.

After more than a week, my throat is no longer as sore, I am better able to breathe, and I am happy. I attendedall of my classes, I stuck to my diet and I have a clean kitchen. I am wearing one of Kenn's old long-sleeved tee shirts and my life is perfect. I am on the verge of finishing one long chapter in my life and beginning another. I have work to do, but I will not. I will sit here and type,numbing my mind with television and burning my retinas on a computer screen, while I enjoy the gentle pangs of hunger and watching the light from the nearest light glinting off my rings as I type. I look up ocassionally to remind my husband that I love him, or to smile at him if tells me the same. I will look for a job another day, and study tomorrow-- maybe.

Now I am simply happy and content, although I am unable to comletely relay the joy in this ordinary, lazy moment. I feel my life so completely and joyfully and I feel so alert, even as I begin to tire. The clock on my screen lets me know that time is passing, but I want it all to stop and leave me here. Let the world continue without me, and allow me to preserve this feeling and keep my existence confined to this evening. Time can flow for everyone else, but I wish to stay here, with my husband and my absolute knowledge of this moment and my own existence. I am present at this time and in this space.
The goosebumps on my arms and the outline of my glasses vexing me as my sense of sight is stimulated by by my surroundings. C.S. Lewis described Heaven in this manner-- I believe it was in "The Great Divorce." A more concrete reality, with blades of grass so much that would slice through human feet and ripples in ponds that would knock a man down. Or maybe this is Thomas Becket's "stillpoint" from T.S. Elliot's "Murder in the Cathedral." I have read them all, but the experience is something wholly other. Maybe this is my preview of other things, or maybe this is simply a concentrated form of joy. Whatever it is, I simply want to preserve it-- selfish as that truly is. This is truth and this is precious to me.

And now as Kenn taps and pounds out rhythms on the drums, and with the words of two different Rich Mullins songs running through my mind as if they were one song, some of which I will share, I bid you all adieu, as I stay here and the rest of the world goes on without me.

. . . With a whirlwind to fuel my chariot of fire
And when I look back on the stars, It'll be like a candlelight in central park.
And it won't break my heart to say goodbye. (Elijah)