My writing this is paradoxical in nature, but you don't understand that just yet (and yet you already have) because I am not alive; I will die yesterday--or, rather, I apologize, I died yesterday (tenses are very loathesome for me to comprehend in sight of my circumstances). My death will be natural in the purest sense of the word and as vexing as death can be upon the mind and body, I won't be very bothered when it finally occurs because I have been dead, or on the occasion, dying for the wholeness of my life; we all were.

In the instance I currently exist it is the day before I meet a very special girl, Harriet, with whom I have collapsed deeply into enamorment. I won't denote much of the relation of this story to her since that perfidious fiend was no more important to its telling than to inform you that she was the supreme cause for my manuscripting this at all (my opinion of her is likely to alter throughout the unfolding of this story, as this story, while written solely by my own hand, has been drafted thus far at varying points of my life, with the most complete portions of it occuring in my twenties and lesser drafts contained in my forties and fifties and it's only natural that my disposition towards her should vary as I occupy different presents). I'll conclude the inclusion of her in the telling of my story by describing her relevance in my displacement from the flow of time: simply put, she will quite literally de-rail me; I will be taken so aback by her sudden and nonchalant break-up with me that I shall lose all bearing and fall off the proverbial train what is carrying us through life, with its seemingly infinite number of cars (each housing a different occurrence, moment in my life), but instead of caroming off whatever ethereal stuff exists in the lateral spaces beyond the understanding of the physical realm, I shall grow a sort of pair of wings and be able to fly about and perceive every instance of my life as a single moment. I am looking into the tops of all the walled train cars where as in the same manner that a drama is performed on a stage, all the moments of my life are busy playing out. Hello, my name was Ryan.

As I stated earlier, tenses have become very difficult for me to manage--I moved swiftly from one place to another in the span of my life, sometimes being a three year old and sometimes a fifty-seven year old and sometimes (quite often) a twenty-two year old and in love for the first time with that sweet, ambrosial thing I know dearly as my Harriet. O, she will be a special thing, indeed.

I don't think what I have written thus far has afforded you an understanding of my circumstances as is necessary for you to draw any nectar from my anecdote; I will expound on the reality of time and God, as I have been granted an understanding of them:

Time, I will discover, is not linear in the slightest; while the events of my life will take place in a type of chronological order, they simultaneously will be scattered and highly relative. Relative: that was precisely what I realize is the case as it pertains to the flow of time; what a romantic notion to cling to that life draws some kind of significance and is random and controlled by the person and not the Numen. From the absolute moment of our conception, I see that every moment in my life is neatly structured and outlined and while I regard myself as an eleven year old right now, and I regard everything what has already taken place in my life as the past, so am I now a six year old and regard everything what rests before me as my future; now I am sixty-one and sitting on my porch. Do you understand? Do you understand that all the moments in our lives are taking place at once and were perpetually being acted out and that past and future was relative to where we currently are and do you understand how utterly frightening that is?

I shied away from realizing the events what will take place in the latter years of my life, though I can not help but perceive them grimly, for they are black and horrible and see me alone and uncared for by any kindred soul; simultaneously, I don't care to acknowledge them, for in doing so I am no longer able to afford myself the same comforting thoughts and devices such as, "Well, the best years of my life are ahead of me,"; "Things can always be worse,"; "I'll never be as happy as I am now!"; I see the exact moment when happiness in my life will pique and begin its decline and how am I to fortify myself against adversity with such knowledge? But I already have.

I turn the focus of my attention on the early years of my life--specifically those few months where Harriet is my admiral and I have hitherto known nothing sweeter (I'm pleased, and disgusted, to say that I never would, either). She is tall and slender and her appearance is rather asymmetrical and awkward in certain areas; namely her eyes, which are precisely twenty-five percent larger than normal eyes (we will measure them against the average) and her smile, which was made up of lips that don't seem to quite line up as they should in the corners. But she will become my doll and when I told her that I will never love anyone as much as her, I will mean it.

Enough with that insipid wart! Hie her to the deuce, She is the root of my metaphysical agony, isn't she? Why should I adore her so when she is the cause of my lament; O, how I wish to return to my life of darkness and ignorance to reality. And the Numen--what mortal ought to be made aware of his scheming? He has trapped me in my old age, just months before my death, which is to take place in my sleep, for that was the present I was drawn to visit because of a chance meeting of my beloved Harriet there, as a genteel and venerable old woman, which, to my dismay, is an even more horrible instance in my life than her initial breaking up with me. See, I suppose he was rather caught up in cosmic affairs elsewhere and only then got around to addressing my rude displacement from his order of things and rather perfunctorily he clipped my wings and let me fall into my present as a withered and fearful old man. But because of this paradox that I cannot fully define, and I believe is only understandable by one as infinite as the Numen, I haven't realized that fate just yet (but am helpless to avoid it) and I freely roam throughout my life as a wanderer with no home. Simultaneously, I am in the dark as to everything that will happen as it pertains to becoming removed from the flow of time and I don't even know who Harriet is!

Worry not for me, for I now share in the infinity that harbors the Numen; as someone immeasurably more fortunate than I am, I would have you walk away from reading this with a heightened sense of gratitude for those walls separating the many, simultaneously occurring occurrences in your life which the Numen has so graciously put up for you that you don't perceive it all at once; mystery is paramount in life, but I would have you also remember that when adversity is all that surrounds you, don't forget that you're also living the happiest, loveliest, greatest moments of your life somewhere else in time!