have no fear.

when we were children, we might have been lucky enough to experience deep security. moments of utter unselfconsciousness. fearlessness. no worry, no anxiety, no question. of course, lots of people never experience such an environment, but i have. when i was young. prepubescent. totally absorbed in task at hand, not a thought to threats approaching or receding. it is a feeling that has happened less and less frequently. in fact, i can't remember the last time i felt it.

and my dreams have paralleled that pattern: when i was five or six or seven or eight i dreamt about flying quite often. i dreamt i came unmoored from the ground and floated up to the tops of the tallest trees, slightly out of control, more than a little worried i might come crashing down in a hard landing when i lost this temporary power. but i was up there, and i felt weightless.

i can't think of the last time i had that dream, either.

i am afraid. i am afraid because the people i love are going to die, and i don't know what that means. i am afraid of loss, of change. but any forest-dweller knows that the fallen log is the ripening earth that creates more life: mosses, fungi, tiny insects. it grows until it isn't more than the woven forest floor, indistinguishable as a tree. new saplings take root there, in the shadow of the former tree, in its tomb. is this consolation? is it explanation?