Neverland

"Some say that we are different people at different periods of our lives, changing not through effort of will, which is a brave affair, but in the easy course of nature every ten years or so. I suppose this theory might explain my present trouble, but I don't hold with it; I think one remains the same person throughout, merely passing, as it were, in these lapses of time from one room to another, but all in the same house. If we unlock the rooms of the far past we can peer in and see ourselves, busily occupied in beginning to become you and me."
-J. M. Barrie, A Dedication to PETER PAN or THE BOY WHO WOULD NOT GROW UP

In summer, time is a funny thing. Moments of hot breath under twilight stars hang immovable and delicious around a sun asleep on the horizon, until the great orb wakes, blushing the sky crimson, and rushes below my line of sight. The world sits dark and endless, waiting to be tasted, touched, lived.

I am unquestionably up to the task.

The strange passage of time excites me. It's a new experience to actually comprehend the steady trickling away of existence - or the collecting of it? These seconds by which we measure our lives will indefatigably fade away; that is inevitable. But every tick of the clock is another step towards eternity, and within eternity. I don't want to lose any of it. Each moment is spent growing a little more into myself, expanding onward, upward, and inward in search of some potential to be actualized. And without a doubt, in the casual step of time, I will find it.

Words of advice from Rilke: "You are so young, so before all beginning, and I want to beg you, as much as I can to be patient towards all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue . . . And the point is, to live everything."

That's the secret, then, isn't it? Appreciating the locks? Because, like placing the final piece of a puzzle, there's a unique gratification that comes from personal accomplishment. And when you've found just the right fit, an entirely new scene unfolds, ripe with unpicked thought and discovery.

I used to envy people who were older than me. I longed for their experiences and wisdom. Lately, though, I've begun to realize how much room is taken up by the emotional baggage of jealousy.

Awe of pure sensation (and I mean my own sensation) is so much more worth the effort.