The Room At The Back Of The House

It’s a moonless winter night and you are alone in the woods. It’s cold and you have been walking for miles, you feel lost beyond hope and you’re not sure if you should keep going on. You stop where you are and take a deep breath in the silence.

But as soon as you pause you hear it isn’t silent. There is the sound of laughter and music just beyond the trees. You turn and walk toward the revelry and as you draw closer, you see glimpses of lamplight ahead.

It’s a party. 

Once you step clear of the trees, a beautiful, cozy house stands before you and gathered all around it is everyone you have ever loved, from all ages of your life and places you’ve lived. Even those who have passed on long ago are there.

Friends, family, mentors, partners, teachers, artists and writers, even fictional characters who have impacted your life are celebrating together – meeting, laughing, debating – and while you approach, you catch their eyes, which are beaming with appreciation and love for you.

But you keep walking, drawn past them to the house, which is friendly and inviting. As soon as you cross the threshold, the door gently closes behind you and the sound of the gathering is muted to a low roar.

Inside you can hear intimate conversations in the rooms to either side as you step into the foyer, past the staircase and the living room, the kitchen, down the hall toward the back of the house. It’s your closest loved ones saying phrases that you have heard before. They are repeating the words that often play in your head when you need encouragement, the best advice you’ve ever received, and the words that have let you know how loved you are.

You are deeper in the house now, approaching the end of the darkened hall where a wooden door is cracked open, allowing a beam of dancing light to enter the interior corridor.

The room is meant for you to enter. 

The door is heavy but swings open with ease and you feel the warmth of the fire crackling in the fireplace. The chill of your long walk in the woods is now a distant memory.

Looking around you see so many pieces of your life gathered here: the worn rug, the books on the shelves, the trinkets on the mantle, the quilt on the bed. They are things that remind you of joyful moments and safe people.

Things ruined in a flood, that you longed for in a shop window, or were lost in a move. But they are all clean and whole and here now in this dreamy room.

The sound of the gathering and all the conversation is almost nonexistent now, you are padded in a peaceful quiet that is nothing like the lonely silence of your night wanderings.

The fire spits and pops and you hear the heavy purring of a cat deep in slumber. Curled in a donut at the foot of the bed, its body rising and falling with soothing regularity.

There is a chair by the bed. You move toward the chair to sit and stroke the soft fur of the big cat.

You realize there is someone asleep in the bed, deep in the pillows. 

They are ancient. Their sweet face is carved with deep lines of joy and grief. Their wrinkles have wrinkles. You have never seen someone so beset and beautiful with time. They are luminous with age, and the expression on their sleeping, wizened face is unmistakable and heartwarming:

Total contentment.

They embody peace.

As you look at them more closely you realize you know them. This person is familiar to you in every way, you are certain you’ve seen them before, but you can’t quite place it.

You pet the purring cat with one hand and with the other you reach for the creased, warm hand of the sleeping one, and hold it comfortably as the last of the weariness from your journey there melts from your feet and back.

You are not in any pain, you are no longer worried about where to go. You do not count time, for this is clearly a timeless space.

You can stay as long as you like.

You sit in the light that emanates from the elder and behold the happy stillness.

You breathe.

Your hand holding theirs begins to radiate.

The light from their skin lights your own.

Feel the light travel up your arm, across your shoulders and down the other arm to your fingertips.

With the spreading light comes the awareness that the person in the bed is you. The you before you came to be and the you that carries on after.

The light travels down your spine and through your heart and lungs, your core, pelvis, legs, feet and toes.

Here you are, knowing everything that has ever been and ever will be in your life, and you are content.

You are at peace.

The light flows up your neck, behind your eyes and shines from the top of your head and as it does it burns up any fear or doubt. All worry for the future or regret about the past. The light charges you like the most nourishing meal and the most restful sleep. The ancient you sleeps on unchanging, as you release their hand and rise to your feet.

You are confident. You are ready. 

Nothing in the room stirs as you move to leave. You look around once more, seeing yourself reflected in every beautiful corner before you step from the room – leaving the door open a crack – and walk back down the hall.

You open the front door and breathe the cold air.

Looking up you see a sky full of stars and you walk on into the night.