When I Am Done

It is an illusion that youth is happy, an illusion of those who have lost it; but the young know they are wretched for they are full of the truthless ideals which have been instilled into them, and each time they come in contact with the real, they are bruised and wounded.

- W. Somerset Maugham, 'Of Human Bondage', 1915

Life is speeding. It wasn't before. I want to hold on, but it is already gone...that moment, that snapshot, that elusive time, endless replay. Gone.

I always wondered why my youth was so painful. And now I have come to realize, it's all painful. That's just how life is. It's only in relative terms that we feel short-changed, maybe because that's what we feed on each and every day...the 'idea' of life...through t.v., movies, commercials, even a beautiful photograph. Oh, how romantic. How hilarious. How perfectly cool. Even reality t.v. ...manufactured.

Still... I like to believe it is possible...to find oneself at long last in that proverbial bower of peace...a cottage perhaps, everything in white, clean, soft inviting light. Cool blue shallows of warm gulf stream water lazily percolating through sugar. And in the early hours of evening...a delicate, dulcet strain of whispered music waltzing with the fickle waves of high tide, crashing, ebbing, shhhhhh....