In the last year old friendships have been growing stronger, stale ones have been dropping away like scabs. There are some people I don't see or hear from anymore, feel less and less of a connection to. For the first time I realize this is okay, and maybe even appropriate. And as a lot of old ties to people and religion fall away new and surprising one grow. It's a graceful time I guess you might say. It is probably the most ALIVE time of my life. All I can do is shake my head and go on in something I think religious people call faith. I will not fool myself, I do not think I am a religious person. If I ever was. And I don't think I have much use for most religious people. If I ever want to see how far conventional religion ever got anyone I have only to remember the last three years of my life. I have only to go to Mass on Sunday and listen to the cantor drone like a dying mule and the priest at Sacred Heart mutter something completely irrelevant.