Out in the World
Ever since you were little, “flying” was your answer when other kids asked what super power you would pick. Why give up that dream now?
As the record hisses to life, you imagine yourself transformed into a lark. The grass around you suddenly looms large as you shrink from your absolutely beautiful, normal, average human height down to that of a songbird. Your sandy-red plume wiggles briefly on the top of your head as your body settles in.
The orchestra awakens, birdsong lifting you gently.
Time seems to slow as you soar higher, cautiously at first. You are kind of new at this whole "flying like a bird” thing.
Before you know it, you’ve forgotten the couch, the walls, the electricity bill that seems higher than normal, and you’re above a forest near the mountain summit.
It feels right. You are yourself as you make long loops and swoops and banks, imagined feathers cutting through the air. Up here in the sky, you feel almost at home.
As the Vaughn Williams music gently drifts to the end, you circle down and land on a branch awash in later afternoon sunlight. The warmth embraces you after so long in the cool blue sky.
A breeze picks up, carrying the aromas of pine and earthen soil, with just a touch of that cool, metallic scent of rain. Then suddenly, something feels amiss. You look left and right, seeing nothing out of the ordinary. Still, your heart beats a little faster. Night is approaching, You can’t explain it, but it feels like… you're being watched.
Do you investigate at the summit with Mussorgsky’s “Night on Bald Mountain?”
or