Random Sequence

"Mona told me about you," she says.

"Oh really," I say. "Good stuff, I hope."

"I'm Celia," she says. "I teach classics at the university. Barb was one of my students."

"Ahh," I say.

"Mona tells me you're in publishing?"

"Sort of," I say. "I write for a trade magazine. Chemical Dynamics."

"Uh-huh. Is that interesting?"

"No. Is classics interesting?"

She laughs. "That's about all it has going for it," she says. "It's interesting to me. And beautiful: 'In the true mythology, Love is an immortal child, and Beauty leads him as a guide: nor can we express a deeper sense than when we say, Beauty is the pilot of the young soul.'"

I nod.

"Emerson," she says.

"Of course."

--from "Because I Can" (by me), which was originally published by Eyeshot