april 24, 2016 - memories

Why am I psyched about this date?
Because "Game of Thrones" returns - and it was Debra and my favorite series on HBO!
John Snow lies dead - in the snow - having been stabbed repeatedly by "brothers" of the Night's Watch. Ghost, John's faithful dire wolf, howls in grief, locked behind a thick wooden door.
So why should a work of fiction weigh so much on the scales of my life? Why does a story anchored in treachery and warfare strongly hold my emotional attention?
I feel Debra beside me right now, smiling at me and mourning the death of Snow - knowing, of course, that the character is just an actor portraying a role - but the fantasy and whimsy thrills the heart and lightens the darkness of my soul.
That is why.
Too deranged? Too gloomy? Perhaps too desperate.
Life is a wondrous gift that has no basis in reality other than the fact of it.
God - who's that?
God - what's that?
Hope is the burning ember that pushes the human race forward into the next sunrise. And hope is the hat rack upon which God is suspended in the minds of all human beings.
Dogs, cats, eagles, giraffes, lions, rhinos, and every other living thing that breathes, feeds, uses senses to navigate through the world, none has a God to pray to or fear.
The emptiness tries to swallow me, the grief tries to strangle my beating heart, but Debra's love still holds me above the waterline, allowing me enough air to survive.
Someone (perhaps Stephen Hawking) once said, "With hope there's life."
Who would argue with that?
Not I.
And now, on with the show.