i sometimes wonder if there are things you cannot possibly know until you have lived them for a while. until you have let the idea work through you, have let it sit and mix with even the dimmest thoughts in your head and the most honest feelings in the farthest, deepest, loneliest part of your gut. and i wonder if maybe you have to cross your fingers and hope or guess wildly or maybe even fake part of it for a time until it becomes real and firm and perceptibly corporeal - until it is solid enough to stay without you needing to think reaffiriming thoughts every five minutes to keep it there.

i really hope that you don't have to fake part of it. i would hate that. it would eat me up. when i was in high school i did this bible study with a good friend and this guy that we took (okay, at least i took) to be a sort of spiritual guide. hacking his way through the supernatural jungle, with us pilgrims in tow. and i remember us talking about how if you didn't 'feel' like you loved Jesus the best way to go about it might be to start living like it and keep hoping until you really did. i am not sure if that is true. i have never been much of a feeler, myself, so, i try not to judge them too harshly.

or maybe that first paragraph is really wrong and that is not the case at all. maybe there is a deeper and more real type of magic moment that i have not yet uncovered in my travels. one that makes you see things you hadn't even guessed were around or even possible. maybe it will come tomorrow when i am thinking about it and hoping for it. maybe it will come in fifteen years when i am alone living with a cat in an attic (a well furnished attic, though, with big windows) and thinking that i desperately wanted this magic to come fourteen years prior. who knows? i do not, for certain. if i had to guess, though, i wouldn't put my money on the magic feeling.

i guess if everything were easy this life would be really boring and tedious. i am glad that the important things are hard to know about. so, thank you Lord for sweaty palms and lumps in the throat and nervous habits and obvious tells at the poker table. i am glad for them.