one winter evening...

Why such a disparity of reactions? Where did it all go wrong? Or was it wrong from the start? No, that fact is untenable. Then there must needs be answers. Must there? Probably not. Then "must is too strong a word. Answers are desired. Or maybe not even answers, as they can be more painful than this void. And answers cannot change reality, which is what is truly desired. No answers then, only a move back to status quo. The previous, unpleasant one. This one is all too familiar, as the words themselves prove. A long face and mindless chatter--both leading to a profound sense of loneliness. Survival is the key here and thankfully the means are not entirely absent. While the larger picture drips of sardonic bitterness, it is the quotidian that is the hardest to deal with. The larger picture can be ignored, at least temporarily. The long everyday hours leave little room for comfort. Or cheer. A world full of lonely people, waiting for that one stroke of magical good luck. All too often that moment passes by,without adequate warning. And then the wait for the next. And the next. In an interminable, inexhaustible line of forced cheerfulness. Faking it becomes the goal and suddenly, one day, the lie becomes the truth. Hope dies a cruel death, and takes with it all that is beautiful. The wake is terrible, unimaginably cold and cruel. Surprisingly, though, very little actually changes. Status quo returns. The one never hoped for, yet endured for the longest time. The one strongly detested, yet lived through, year after melancholy year. Age comes. The coming of age. Youth appears to be a dream--long forgotten, very briefly lived and intensely enjoyed. It is an eternal strife with a dead, soulless, pitiless world. A world that taunts you with a beauty never to be had. Tempts, dares you constantly to cross that one invisible line separating love from a hopeless, pointless existence. Yet that line can never be crossed. Not with any definite sense of finality. What is the meaning of such a life? Why do we hang on to the slimmest threads of incredulous belief? Why not take the final chance and let it all go? Questions, whose answers we do not know. Or perhaps, we do. We hang on just to see the next pointless sun rise, the next meaningless day unfold in all its majesty. Because we never stop hoping. Because we never stop looking for that moment of bliss that might be just around the corner. What if all we needed was just a tiny miracleto that next step? What if all we needed was just that vision of uncontrolled passion, of a love beyond all human, divine belief? And so we hold on to whatever shred of despair we choose to call hope and look for the next, tiniest of all, miracles.