Living, being in the world, was a much greater and stranger thing than she had ever dreamed. - Ursula K. Le Guin

Only in silence the word, only in dark the light, only in dying life: bright the hawk's flight on the empty sky. — The Creation of Éa

We didn't talk about problems, or parents, or automobiles, or ambitions. We talked about life....And the sea was there, forty feet away and getting closer, and the sky over the sea, and the sun going down the sky. And it was cold, and it was the high point of my life.
I'd had high points before.
Once at night walking in the park in the rain in autumn.
Once out in the desert, under the stars, when I turned into the earth turning on its axis. Sometimes thinking, just thinking things through.
But always alone. By myself.
This time I was not alone.
I was on the high mountain with a friend. There is nothing, there is nothing that beats that. If it never happens again in my life, still I can say I was there once.

Oh, never and forever aren't for mortals, love. But we won't be parted till I know it's right that we part.