An evening in Virginia with family

There was a moment when I was in college when everything seemed to be ahead of me. I remember it exactly. It was the Fall of my junior year at Washington and Lee. We played a football game that afternoon on Wilson Field. We lost. But it didn't matter that much; we lost a lot of games. My parents were at the game, up from Atlanta. My cousin Carolyn was with them. There may have been someone else; I don't remember. After the game, I showered and dressed and we drove down to Roanoke for supper. We ate at a steakhouse called the Black Angus. We sat at a table and they brought meat to our table and asked us how we wanted it cut, how much, which cut. That night, I got just what I wanted. A good meal. The pleasure of my family's company. The atmosphere was not special. It wasn't rich. It was nice and quiet and comfortable. Afterward, we left the restaurant and the lights of Roanoke, Virginia were lit against the mountains which surround it on all sides. Headlights passed and broke to our right and left and ahead of us and behind us. The stars of the Autumn evening broke above our heads as my father's car headed back to Lexington. In the bright moonlight, you could see the Blue Ridge as the mountains rose and fell and the rivers and streams passed beneath and beside the bridges on the interstate highway. As we got closer to Lexington, the only lights were the stars and the planets and the moon. But it was so bright that it could have been early morning and the coming of the morning sun. That night, I went back to my apartment and my family returned to their motel rooms, but I don't think I have ever felt so safe and in touch with my powers as if I were standing on some precipice seeing the kingdom that I would inherit spread out before me. I don't think I have ever felt the love and confidence and the grace and power of a setting as much as I felt it that evening. If I could just feel that way again, someday, some where. Those moments pass us so quickly, replaced with other days and nights and dreams.