Seeing Stars

I keep lying down and finding myself, staring at the ceiling, expecting to see stars. Yet I know perfectly well that there will be no stars there, that the only thing that will appear before my eyes is the speckled pattern of old and water-damaged ceiling tiles. But I keep conjuring before myself the image of the night sky, the way it used to be, the way it's supposed to be, the way I miss seeing it on long camping trips where nothing mattered anymore.

That was the beauty of camping. Getting out of the world, out of the ordinary, mundane, nonsense-cluttered lives we all lead and seeing nature for what it is. It's a chance to forget about our sorrows and move beyond our doubts. So there I lie, on a semi-regular basis, watching the "stars" of the ceiling disappear before my eyes, and see reflected in my thoughts the freedom of those long, sweet memories.

Maybe that's the beauty of such recollection. That years later, we can lie back down beneath a ceiling full of holes and see before us the quilt of stars that covered the sky. In moments like these, we remember power and passion; sympathy and compassion. We truly start to live again. So maybe it's not perfect. Maybe it's not where we want to be.

But it's where we are, it's the floor we lie on, the walls we press ourselves against, and the ceilings we stare up at in hope of finding inspiration. Sometimes we just forget the rest of the world, let it all go, and remember what it means to really feel again. The moments are so soon forgotten, the emotions quickly smothered by everyday life, but they remind us of what life really is, the peace that it can sometimes be so grandly filled with.

It may be no more than a ceiling, but there is no reason it can't bring back a minute of much-needed rest, a moment of grateful reflection, an instant of precious time.