This Moment: 10:55 P.M. February 24,2012

Jupiter, Venus, and Mercury look like school children qued up and waiting for their headmistress, the waxing crescent moon's glowing almost closed eye, to close completely so they can break from the line and scamper recklessly across the dark western sky. Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 6 in B Minor is hectoring my last nerve. Prokofiev is more suited for the mood of the evening, but I can't find a listing on satellite so The Allman Brothers Band's Pony Boy will have to do. The dogs are both curled into sleep. Midnight is a little more than a half hour away, and instead of turning to sleep, I find myself resisting and thinking of the sun rising half a world away. The night is filled with a silence I don't recognize. On my drive home from an early dinner with a friend, a radio program spoke of Vincent Van Gogh's gift and his misfortune of being open and prey to the tempestuous emotions of childhood. Vincent never truly grew up. It was only when he committed himself that he found the unfettered silence and understanding he so craved, in the ordered regimen of the asylum. He also found friendship and kindness in his fellow inmates. Eventually the soul finds it's tribe. A train's wheels on rails sounds like punctuated gunfire.