I woke bleary and bumbling and uncertain with a blazing headache. Out of the blue. Light sensitive. Sore throat. All of it out. Yesterday afternoon, riding hard on my bike, and then this morning: sick. Who knows why? My friend texted, wisely, "Its a sign to refocus on you for just a bit." So I called off meetings, crawled back under the covers and spent most of the day in a half-dream state, half in my body, half out. I felt myself at the edges of my skin, a layer of dream overlaying my real world as it passed by in slow motion: the dog coming and going, email notifications, T on the phone (working from home today), the boys coming home (from a sleepover at their grandparents) and crawling into bed, their fingers sticky, their eyes wide and grinning. I felt permeable. I could feel how I am a creature of story, a figment of muscle and dream. I could feel the way I am only here, and then not here, only real and then not real: in my body, and then out of it, in spirit spreading out across the space and beyond it. Have you ever felt that way? At the periphery of yourself, where you understand that you are at once more and less than all the things you say you are, and all the things you imagine.