He had reached that stage of life when the windows and doors of time opened and let in the delicious freedom from work. For forty-five years he spent his days doing the bidding of others, of the demands of schools, of extrinsic motivation to get up and out the door and into the great gears and wheels that kept a society operating.
But today, this cold January morning, he sat with a cat on his lap and a cup of coffee in his hand and ruminated on the dreams that had been disturbing him nightly, waking him in the wolf hours. He got up in the dark on those nights and went out into the cold air to look at the waning moon and wonder about the voices that called him out of sleep.
We are, each of us, a repository of stories, one of the voices said. It's your work to create that story out the chaotic mess of your experience, to live becoming, even if it means leaving the comfort of your rest years.
Damn, he thought. What does that portend?
His entire life had been lived under the whispers of that voice. In the beginning, he had lived on nothing, had hitchhiked across the country, slept under bridges, wandered along wilderness streams -- all in search of the source of that voice.
But then he left the rocky path of searching for more security when he got married and raised two sons. That, of course, exacted its own kind of payment.
Sleeping while dragons wander can come back to haunt a man on his death bed.
So a choice now lay in front of him, as he sat there in his chair, looking down the barrel of a day wide open to possibility. He could follow the sirens and take the path of comfort or he could take the path that led into dangerous shadows, work undone, and go in search of what treasures he might never find.
Dust lay on everything he needed. He would have to clean up his traveling boots, shoulder the worn pack, face down the voices that said no, and set out to wake the sleeping desires, uncover the hungry heart.
You cannot serve two brides, dear bride groom, a voice somewhere cautioned him.
