It is evening and I’m standing outside on the edge of a road leading out of a town that is unknown to me. Unknown because I have never been here before. I do not recognize the place, yet there is a sense of deja vu. There are no other people about, yet I don’t feel alone. I understand just what it means to be comfortable in your own skin. I find that I am comfortable everywhere. I think that maybe I have the good fortune to never be in harm’s way.

 As I look up at the stars there was a blast of light miles away from me, down the road and way out of town. It lights up the buildings, streets, parked vehicles and clumps of trees. The burst of light evaporates, leaving the night sky glowing with a hazy, putrid pinkish-yellow pallor. I hear someone say that it was an atomic explosion. Sirens sound and loudspeakers advise people to either wear their masks  or just not breathe. I don’t see any loudspeakers and do not know where that advice was coming from. People start emerging from their dwellings and making a a panicked and exaggerated show of donning the cloth masks once worm during the height of the epidemic. I don’t have a mask and find it absurd to hold my breath. 

I tell myself: Fuck it. I take a couple of deep breaths. I feel some relief from the tension and fear in the air. I come to the conclusion that I’ve lived long enough in this interesting world, that I had my fill of wonder and joy, and have no interest surviving in a world that is seriously compromised by a possible apocalyptic event. I do not want to live in a place where everyday promises to be a struggle. Nope.

I defiantly take some deep breaths and wait to see what will happen next.

Nothing does.

I’m in a different place. It’s on the edge of town, and nothing seems to be moving. There are no other people here. The trees are as still as the empty streets. There is no sound. Not the buzzing in my ears nor the beat of my heart. I notice that there is only one building in the area, which looks like a large white cube with a couple of windows. The rest of the area is indistinct, as is the time of day. The structure is not alive in the sense that buildings are alive; its accumulated history of its construction and usage. I feel that disorienting sensation of encountering something new and foreign. I hesitate to give this experience a name. I do not try to understand it.

Instead, I sit down on a boulder that looks like it’s part of a monument, and I wait. Wait for what? I don’t know. Maybe a sign, maybe a gesture, an insight or a revelation. Maybe for something to happen.

I sit and just wait. I notice that the waiting is peaceful, calming. I don’t expect anything to happen, and I don’t mentally chase after anything. Being in this place of silence and stillness is enough, and I feel absorbed by the simplicity of being here. I don’t want anything else and surrender.

Then something happens. It’s almost imperceptible, but the building slowly comes alive. It still looks the same – a large white cube – but it becomes more than a large white cube. I do not know what. It continues to be a mystery to me, but it’s no longer devoid of historic qualities. I do not probe any further. Instead, I find joy in the process of waiting, enjoy the stillness of the place, and the payoff of my patience. I come to the realization that everything – trees, rocks, streets, clouds, buildings, creatures big and small are all alive with their accumulated history, and in silence does this aliveness reveal itself.