4700 year old ancient bristlecone pine, found in the White Mountains, California by Simon Christen
The angels never left us—even through the bleakest valleys of the 90’s Dark Ages they remained close by. They watched solemnly from perches just above our heads and come down to whisper in our ears, invisible except to children and the dying. It was like Wings of Desire meets The Day the Earth Stood Still: they wore perfectly tailored dark space suits and lived in UFOs protected by invisible shields. Their ancient memories stretched across our human moments like the long shadows of trees falling upon children playing at dusk. Our meaty little lives were absurdly short while theirs were infinitely long and glowing…tuned in to the frequency of Loving Grace. As protective older siblings they wanted to help and yet they were squashed between realities and unable to make themselves fully known to us. They couldn’t stop us as our distracted minds shut them out and made messes of our lives.
In my own version of the 90’s I was a confused and lonely teenager who clung to a fundamental, cold hearted truth—that we were born alone and died alone and that was that, despite all other pretense and accomplishments. I accepted this scientific truth as a kind of death sentence—each movement I made encased in the essential pessimism that is at the center of absurdity. It was a truth that let me fall apart without expectation for anything else. An anger rose in my voice when I discussed matters of life and death with people who believed in God, especially if that God was one that cared about any of us. How could anyone find evidence for that… I thought those who believed were ignorant and scared—weak sheeple.
And yet even through the heavy black veil of my intellectual and emotional disdain something nagged at me, pointing at this or that magical thing that would happen.
There were moments when the long silent sky started whispering above me…and I was made to realize that this wasn’t just happening in my life, but in the life of all humanity, the spirals of its ages intertwining.
The sun was saying something, the rippling clouds were an inverted sea of understanding. We lived for years like that—half asleep on our feet.
And then, on 9/11, the clouds pulled back like curtains, instigating a time of crystal blue emptiness. The time of waiting for the tsunami of KNOWING…
For the faces of angels to appear in the technicolor skies above.
Broken free from in between the thick glass panes of possibility
Shining bright eyed in citywide, cinemascope…
That time is NOW.
