Quinius

I had a dream Saturday night. As dreams go, it was mundane: regurgitated scenarios, settings, and props from the past twenty-nine years or so. What was different was the presence of someone who’s been gone for a whole decade. When I woke up, I expected a wave of sadness, guilt, or loss: a good emotional outburst. After none of that happened, I prepared myself for a familiar short-breathed tour of Black Void Apathy National Park. Nope.

I’ve only been in love once. I’ve been comfortable since, yes, but it’s not quite the same. One of the great comforts of my life told me that I should get over my damage. It’s good advice of course; I tripped over my own feet years ago and I’m still obsessed; framing it all as a dramatic clash between man and gravity instead of a goofy beginner’s tumble.

Every year, starting on the 26th of September and continuing until the first Tuesday after Veteran’s Day (November 15th), I celebrate Quinius. In all actuality, I’m a lapsed Quinius observer, but ten is a nice round number to make me think that 2011 is somehow special and maybe I should get my shit together for it.

Quinius is a time of reflection and atonement. It’s also a time where we try to move past our obsessions and obsessiveness to find and address the underlying features of our souls which birth them. In many ways, Quinius should be a death in the shadow of new life; the death of each now that becomes our past and the birth of each future that becomes the present.

Wow. I try not to wax too poetic here, but wow. You could wrap that last paragraph around twine and make a candle. Anyway, Quinius is about the future, the past, old friends long gone. Quinius attempts to strip away the irrelevancies and leave truth, in its purest, most personal form.