The withering legs of the racehorse.

Remember that day, Barrick, my friend - my ally - you the standalone symbol of youth and eloquence which has saddled me in the times throughout my life when all of rationality was lost and despair was the only thing my ears could hear or expect. The day when, amid a cooling breeze which saw the wind serenade the grass, our toils being entrenched in nothing more innocent than playground shenanigans - the sun fell to the horizon and the slit of the sun blazed the contour of the very Earth. I remember it vividly, dear friend. It was a magical exasperation, a moment of anxiety, when we both submitted death to our legs and stood stiller than any stalagmite frozen in time. The connection we shared was ethereal but true, I could feel your thoughts whirling around - surmising the very questions which permeated my mind, I - no you were the first to enunciate the most magnificent question, "What lies beyond the unseen whose golden light makes lame the very grass beneath out feet?"

How can the seeming continuity of the world be so easily broken? Was it not the same grass over there as the grass we stood on? How then can it be made so magnificent and unworldly as to legitimately call to question if gravity ceased to exist there, that weight was suspended and the possibilities of our imagination could fly without any hint of limitations? I remember the scramble, the burst of energy, the intangible glee that left giddiness on our mouth and dirt beneath our shoes, the mad dash so as to be the first to reach that horizon, that magical world - to be the first to rule the realm of anything possible and anything happy and for a time that my legs were stronger and my mind quicker the distance between you and I began to grow, and I could not longer hear your incessant laughter as clearly as I wanted and then I turned around to see you stopped. "C'mon, I won't hog it to myself, you'll be the first to go in ok? You better save me all the water slides!" Your reply, which has haunted me to this day, "There is no land of wonder, it's just a flying emblem in the wind, a kingdom of air don't you understand?" I felt all the levels of rejection flow through my body, begging to be released almost as if my very being should assume a fist and send a mighty blow for hearing such heresy. "Are you blind? Can you not see, it's just over there, fool." Berrick, your response I do believe was, "See for yourself, you need no guidance from me, you move but it moves farther still, there is no hope of capturing such a thing."

For what are men but vessels of words, blind to anything else, they must assume the forms of limitations and the natural wonders are but conceived and buried in the very realm which they are created. Men speak of freedom, but there is no liberation from these bonds, they are ethereal, and shift counter side to each of his reckless swings, always able to evade capture, but always able to bond. Every once in a while we'd hear that random philosopher with the jester's smile and the suggestive gaze twirl his thoughts around and convince us of our inherent freedom, of worlds unknown beckoning for us and of love between humans unconditional and without limit, and in those moments of consideration, of self contemplation whilst within the closest of proximity, we would convince ourselves if only for a moment, that perhaps fantastical realms did exist, that men can sully themselves in dreams without being branded with failure and that love between those we really cherished could surface to glow a self-evident glare so as to remove all darkness and suffering from our hearts. In these moments, however brief, the intent was successful, and perhaps lucky for us the philosopher was after our hearts and not our money, for perhaps thrown off the path of logic we'd have thrown anything to make this premise a reality, of goods not deemed fit for us but that we could deem the laws that make them unfit, unfit. Then the inevitable residual oscillation back to reality, to our current state of affairs, the glacier re solidified and the escaping droplets ran off into the bottomless ocean.

Berrick, forgive me that my mind has forgotten most of our interactions before that year, from memories of high school --------