Other than our road trip, Norm and I spent a quiet summer alone mostly. Quiet is truly what I needed in order to jettison the flotsam that had been accumulating in my brain for the last several years.

To say farewell to summer, Norm took me for a boat ride early in the morning on Labor Day. Just the two of us existed on the lake for a long while. Us and a solitary duck, that is. This loner lolled by creating nary a wake as we inched onward.

The haze that enveloped the lake reminded me of the moors in Wuthering Heights – fearsome yet alluring all the same. In the distance, I spotted an angler patiently casting his line, over and over again, waiting for a bite. It seemed as though a metaphor for my life was squeezed into his motions. He was mesmerizing; his oneness with his surroundings – indeed, his very existence – cathartic for this fractured soul.

Then the sun burned off the mist, and another day waned. As we walked the hill towards home, the hand of the universe reached down and painted a canvas that only our eyes beheld. Imagine that – artwork just for the two of us.

And the day ended in the same manner in which it started.

Home.