text: I didn't know what it was yet, the first time I felt time freeze around me. When I was a kid, my dad used to always stop at every sunset he saw, every extra crisp wave. Click. Hed motion his hands like a camera and save them. He told me he'd keep them in his memory. Close his eyes and see. He was a mystery to me, A typical New England Man. The driest sense of humor i've ever come across, the fiercest loyalty in sports teams. He had this ability about him, this magic that turns the simplest moments into gold. The brightest blue eyes. I came across this old video not long ago. He was born the day after Christmas, disappointment day. When I see it now it breaks my heart. How young me and my younger brother look. All I can see is how fluorescent pink my jean jacket is, how I must've thought the rhinestones on my jeans would make me seem cooler to the eighth graders. The bluntness of my sidebangs which I still totally regret. I see Will is still not tall, his voice is still too young, he still hasn't been hurt by anything. It hurts watching us sing and trip over ourselves fighting to put the plate down, jockeying for the favorite. But the moment that will always make my breath catch is the ending. “Make a wish!!” we exclaimed, barely able to hold in our giggles, how proud we were to have made a boxed cake by ourselves. “Make a wish” he echoed. And then he closes his eyes. It's so brief, but in that second I think the earth stood still for him. Sketching his own cathedral. I don't know what he wished for. 10 more years, maybe five. Probably not six months. I don't like to think about it too much. The night after it happened I stayed up. I sat and I looked at photographs scared to even blink. I didn't want to close my eyes. I thought if I closed my eyes id be able to pretend what had happened had not, that if I closed my eyes when I opened them again, it had been a dream. I was afraid to close them because the opening of them again is what brings back reality. So I kept them open. I watched the sunrise and my eyes watered but I didn't cry because it wasn't a reality. Sometimes I wish id kept them open before that moment. A lot of the times I think I kept my eyes closed the entire time my childhood was unraveling in front of me. But as I watched my dad blow out his final birthday candles, give his final birthday wish. They opened. Sometimes I wish I could close them again, and just draw, pretend what I've seen is and is not. I'd give anything to be blind for a day, to smell the cloying scent of butterscotch and not be taken back to that birthday. But maybe it's better to go through with them open. Maybe it's better not be so sweet to the world, like icing on a boxed cake. It helps keep you guarded. If you never close your eyes again you`ll always see it coming I suppose. I feel that that can't be all though. I think it'll wrap around again. Maybe someday ill be able to trust enough to shut my eyes again. Maybe the earth will stop for me. Give me a moment of my own. His hand over mine guiding. tracing and retracing my own cathedral.