Everyone has one. That magic moment of first conscious ripeness. It always connects in some way with our power among others, but the feeling is probably never greater than when we give ourselves away. Someone thinks we’re valuable; we think someone else is valuable. A cog drops into place on the wheel of destiny, and out of the purple shadows of enchantment our eyes glisten fire. The sweet sting of perfection is an instant addiction.

It may come in a first kiss, a vow and a varsity ring, the prom, a wedding, a honeymoon…or maybe something as unheralded and subtle as a feeling of magnetism shared by two. The ripeness is our prerogative to spend ourselves. But like the opening act on a stage, the magic moment veils scenes yet to come in our lives. Flats move, scenery shifts, scrims dissolve to reveal succeeding acts. We miss our marks, muff our lines, the plot fails to catalyze. Themes and the surrounding cast – life – evolve toward compromised ideals. But still…we yearn for the return of that perfection when we knew our worth.  

There may be pauses in the play, bad reviews, suspensions, re-writes, plays within plays – anachronisms, as exclusive and out of sync as a stitch in time: …looking over our shoulder at what might have been, the aftertaste of honey, something impossible yet irrefutable, nectar and ambrosia in an alternate reality – the Mother Church of Dreams. And still…perfection 2.0. Ripeness revised.

But perfection exists only in the script now, a dream on paper. Is this a comedy? a satire? We gave away our ripeness in Act I and the plot stumbles on blindly through ad-libs and prompts. Do you “play it as it lays” or try to pick it up where prerogatives were lost?

Can you give away ripeness twice? Is it a nickel on a string – spent but still yours? Or is it a perception like quantum that exists only in the moment of discovery – a moment of perfection to be seized upon or forever lost?

Truths are inexorable. They may shatter your window with the hermetic imbalance of a vacuum created by a tornado, or they may open that window as gently as a rose unfolding to the sun. Either way, once discovered they remain. THAT’S THE PERFECTION.

Ask the universe. Ask the seasons on planet Earth. Time lurches backward every year so that you may see a whole new production you never saw before. And here we are again. Hello, Spring. Is that a new outfit? I like what you’ve done with last Fall’s corpses. Turned them all into births and renewals – good show!

Spring dresses garishly and flirts with siren songs you cannot escape. Inhale and the ether is intoxicating, turn and you catch the wind’s caress, close your eyes and sensory’s afterghosts remain. It doesn’t matter what stage of life you are at. Spring belongs to everyone, every year. Did you think you cashed in all your prerogatives? Silly. Behold the new arrivals for ancient rites!

I watched an injured wild turkey dying over the last week of winter. There were his tracks in the snow, a zigzag that probably meant he was mostly hopping, staggering. But the snow was so deep that it was hard to tell how mobile he was. Still, he was moving. I tossed peanuts out the window the first time I saw him, but a squirrel invited himself to dinner, and I couldn’t tell who was the main benefactor. Besides peanuts raining on the wounded bird, I played the T sax for him (“Turkey in the Straw” and “Turkey Trot”), but it seemed to put him to sleep.

Anyway, I didn’t follow his tracks. Didn’t want to know. I just imagined he healed rather than that a predator got him. Maybe he’ll stop by some time just to say hello. I saved a squirrel once, and the next week I was leaning over a car engine and felt something on my foot. Squirrel. Had to be the same one I rescued. And another time, I put an umbrella over a barrel planter on my upper deck where a mother duck had laid her 11 eggs, and when they hatched and they all tumbled to the ground below, she trusted me to show her how to get around the landscaping to the lake. Whenever I canoed near her after that, she didn’t scramble the troops to safety. So, life returns in some form or another, and Spring is its affirmation. You can trust that. Listen for the whippoorwill or the buds clacking on the window. It’s then you’ll know your magic moment has arrived. Again.

Photos below: #1-2 selfies at home and waiting at the drive-thru for Cane’s chicken fingers; #3-4 my new career as a turtle obstetrician offering water births on the lawn to a turtle laying eggs; #5-6 couple of Crow-Hassan views of nature’s parlor; #7 blast-from-the-past photo of my first chin feathers. 

Thomas "Sully" Sullivan