Date: Wed, 09 Aug 2000 08:53:59 PDT
From: nathaniel finley
Subject:

Here in the Netherlands I have had my vacation for two weeks now. In less then two weeks more my journeys will return me to the US. If there are any out there who still wonder what it was I was doing here, for truly I did not understand fully myself when I first began this adventure, I will try to explain with the few words that I have and a voice that cannot be heard over the computer. The following, after I reread it, are the words of my heart. If the sentences sound a bit in the wrong century I apologize to those of you who are living in timed space. For the rest of you, and especially for those of you that I truly love, I offer you my soul:

For Robert,
I came here to find the music that I lost long ago. I came here searching for the symphony of my heart that I myself had made quiet and would no longer hear in the days when my soul was black with lies and my eyes would no longer see the world around me. I was lonely, but more than that, I was eager to escape from the chains of my own bondage. I came here to revisit those chains, but not to undo them, rather to set them as the anchor for my long wandering ship.

Yes, I came here to find my work, to define my profession, to explore a foreign land. But there will always be explorations on my horizon, and my eyes will never grow weary of the thrill of new people and a strange heritage, which, I am sure, when revealed in their true beauty, are not as strange as they once appear.
But I have found more than adventure, and have discovered more than the knowledge that words can ellucidate. Who shall take from me myself? These are the bonds that I have been granted, like a gift from the winds that carry me and lift me and support me, and if God the Self were to break these chains then I am certain that it is for the sole purpose of replacing them with stronger, truer, more steadfast ones. Thanks to the will of God and the patient love of true friends I have found the home that I have sought so long for, and that, if anything, was the purpose of this trip.

some will say that I am a fool, that I have been searching for the irrational in a rational world, for the undefinable in a time when nothing remains undefined. To these people I answer: I am the son of The Enlightenment, and I will not lay content in my father's shadow as some have wont to be. Nor will I remain ever content with the paths that others tread for me to follow. This is the heritage that I will leave behind me in the world of shadows that few human eyes percieve: I have always been, and ever will be, content only in the council whose music flows from the stream of eternity. Let a new romance be kindled, for the fire of the Enlightenment has blinded the eyes of the world.

In two weeks time I look forward to seeing many of you who are on this mailing list. With others of you the time for reunion must be postponed. I regret the distance created between friends, but I will never regret the friendships. In due time all will be revealed...
Apocolyptically yours, from Leiden in the Netherlands (a wonderful city, really),

Nathaniel