Every day for several years now, I’ve passed this Nick
Patton print that hangs in my hallway next to a large mirror. They complement and
balance each other, framing worlds both present and ethereal. The mirror flips
me around, offering a perspective I can only see from outside myself. It shows
me the forest while I’m still among the trees. Conversely, Nick’s painting draws me in and
invites me to a different place, somewhere very familiar, just out of memory’s
reach. A beam of sunlight warms a wooden chair and my mood. Light slats blaze
with floating dust protozoa, undulating, in and out of view like microscopic
bumper cars, cilia driving directionless traffic. Children’s voices, muted in
dual soliloquy, bounce softly down the stairs. Presents still wrapped in brown paper
coats, vie for space on a high shelf inside the narrow closet, chair sentinel
guarded, offering an invitation to sit. I pause, quiet in the moment, before my
climbing footsteps make my presence known to the eager chaos that awaits me
there, more valuable than each breath I take on my way home, just 5 stairs up.
hmh
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