My. My my oh my.

Got the book at 12:05, home and reading by about 12:20, surfaced for the final time at 5:30, staring around blearily at a world that somehow seemed completely changed.

I swallowed it in one big gulp and want to do a full re-read. Went through a couple of parts today. I laughed, I cried, I yelled "yes!" in triumph. There's still questions I'd like answered, but that's OK for now.

Now I just need to sit for a while and take it in.


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Oh, the torment bred in the race,
the grinding scream of death
and the stroke that hits the vein,
the hemorrhage none can staunch, the grief,
the curse no man can bear.

But there is a cure in the house,
and not outside it, no,
not from others but from them,
their bloody strife. We sing to you,
dark gods beneath the earth.

Now hear, you blissful powers underground -
answer the call, send help.
Bless the children, give them triumph now.

Aeschylus, The Libation Bearers

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Death is but crossing the world, as friends do the seas; they live in one another still. For they must needs be present, that love and live in that which is omnipresent. In this divine glass, they see face to face; and their converse is free, as well as pure. This is the comfort of friends, that though they may be said to die, yet their friendship and society are, in the best sense, ever present, because immortal.

William Penn, More Fruits of Solitude