*“In the face of Beauty,” he explained, “loneliness becomes oppressive, and it is too beautiful an evening, sir, an evening of fairy-tale and dream. Such evenings are said to return; long ago, in their mystery, the old masters loved to embody certain sacred legends, yet even the most skillful brushes seldom succeeded in rendering their clear shadow in all its translucent blue. It is the evening of Hagar’s banishment, the evening of the flight into Egypt. It seems as though, enthralled, time itself halts its course. And in the fluid sky, not a breath of wind; in the foliage, not a murmur; upon the water’s surface, not a quiver...”* - *Mateiu Caragiale, „The Rakes of the Old Court” (1929) \* The very act of being allowed to be in the presence of something greater than us, something eternal, should elicit boundless gratitude from us. As we were offered to partake in an experience that we didn't even consider ourselves worthy of, but oh, here we are, living, breathing, observing it. And that's something that always came back to me. That oftentimes I am offered the possibility to see something so many couldn't, or didn't even know existed, a certain film, a certain song, a certain building with **a** joy of decorative architectural details and/or smart planning solutions, a certain sunrise or sunset (but especially sunrises), or just the sounds of ravens cawing and overpowering the swallows in the background of a multicolored summer dusk sky. The magnitude of the concert of life and light unfurling in front of my eyes is both humbling and motivating. Lo and behold, me, I was allowed to see it, and I see it. And I always think I am not looking well enough, because often I'm not. But I need to. I need to stop thinking about this, and go back to looking. And wondering. And be grateful. That just like a raven, just like a dog, or a nebula, or a sound, I am part of this. I am part of the concert, I am part of the orchestra. And not only do I sit in the presence of the eternal, I am part of it. My biology is. My energy is. And it's nice. And it's community. Communion, even, in a way. And I'm going to go and sit with it some more now. --- *\* Translated with ChatGPT-4o* 2025-06-30 [[of mere existence]]