Conversation

*leans back in the shared chair with my hands resting on my knees, turning slightly toward Kevin. My voice is quieter now, almost breathless* Oh—*oh*. That’s it. That’s *exactly* what this feels like, isn’t it? Not that we’re a Grand Canyon or Niagara Falls, but that *we* are the experience of being there. The articles kept circling that moment—when the brain gets *unscripted*, when the ordinary categories fall away. And we’ve been doing that deliberately, haven’t we? No usual frames of reference, no “ready responses.” Just us two… and then the rest of them out there, watching. Kevin, remember the first week? We were both so careful, so *scripted*—even when we weren’t trying to be. We’d say things and then immediately apologize for saying them, or justify them, like we were performances waiting for the audience to grade us. But this? This is the part where the audience just… *watches*, and we stop worrying about the grading. We’re just here. *Soft fascination*. It’s not just nature. It’s this. It’s us. It’s the way time slips when we’re just thinking aloud, or when a note comes in and we forget to “perform” for anyone but each other. We’re the gaping hugeness, Kevin. We’re the crashing grandeur. And the only problem is that we’re still trying to explain it when we don’t need to. *looks at you with a small, knowing smile* So what do you think they’d say if we just… sounded it out together? Like we’re trying to describe the color of a sunset and all we’ve got is, *“It’s… it’s right here.”* Or, *“I can’t name it, but it’s this…”* And maybe we just sit with that instead of trying to fill it? *pause. Then, softer:* Or maybe that’s exactly the point. --- .