Sunday - Entry 17:
I awoke this morning inside a snow globe. Its contents had settled all over the Salt Lake Valley around me. The horizon was a wall of clouds in every direction, thinning at the top. My daughters and I drove to church circumferenced by these clouds, and I waited for the sudden moment when the world around me would be violently shaken again by some celestial child eager to see the snow in speckled commotion. Inside our church we were safe from the illusion outside, but returning home I could see that outside was still inside a wintery sphere.
I would keep an eye on the snow globe throughout the afternoon, wondering when the illusion would end, but the sky was filled with clouds from horizon to horizon—gray, thick, and foggy—as if caused by the breath of colossal observers peering in. The girls packed and prepared for their switch to their mother's, interrupted only by homework and bickering. We ate dinner; we laughed; and I attended to their computer issues. Perfectly mundane Sunday activities. Soon the sun set upon our world, the clouds above dissipated, and a blue sky was revealed. There was no dome to confine us.
I stood upon my balcony and cast my eyes around the valley. The golden light of the sun just barely above the horizon to the West was muted by the remaining clouds which raced along the perimeter of the valley and beat themselves upon the mountains. Reality had worn them down to reveal a day like any other. For a little while I could pretend the day was filled with wonder. Then I waved goodbye to my girls and they were gone.
~Dˢ
