I ended my 44th year with a strange realization ... this requires Scriabin ... a morning light like no other ...
It began with two of the last sentences I wrote last week.
I am finding that I do well to keep the associates of the "day job" beloved right where they are -- we shine together in responsibility, but beyond that ... no. There is nothing discretionary about the nature of our relationships, and so it should remain.
Inside the structure of the work and ministry that I have, the majority of people know their roles and are faithful. No need to mess with perfection.
Also, another shoe dropped from the past ... a family I have known for three generations has a middle-generation member that has done a massive community flip out and is burning every bridge and making people sorry for giving her chance after chance ... this hit me like a knife through the heart ... but then I looked back and realized it has been moving this way for years ... anger, yes ... denial, no ... bargaining, no ... depression, yes ... acceptance, yes ... all in a half-day ... but then I turned my soul back into the light ... I can pray, and there is literally nothing else I can do that justifies my brooding over the matter.
The last incident highlighted for me the unique situation I am in: I
have no existing or past pool from which to draw close friends. I have painted myself out of every corner that has not imploded or simply succumbed to age. Other than my fictional companion here in Q-Inspired, I have not even had a walking partner for six years. But I was called to my grand old soldier in due time, all those years ago ... and perhaps, in due time, there will be another calling.
In the meantime, the horizon is mine to explore alone. It has been for quite some time. I am as one slightly surprised to realize I've been here for awhile, but distracted and grieving over sunsets of associations past ... but now, having turned around without realizing it at the end of 2025, thus dazzled in the surprise of a new morning ... and accepting it as a good thing.
Once abandoned on a journey to New York by a former associate, heartbroken and afraid, I heard a Voice say to me, "Now I have you right where I want you!" Thus began a journey of wonders! That was the same Voice, a decade and a half later, that said to me, "Come unto Me ... I'll give you rest!"
So perhaps now, is there an echo in here?
Now I have you right where I want you!
I suppose then I should go on and "Rejoice very much, O my soul," and get with the program that little-known but fine composer Justin Heinrich Knecht so well laid out...
But like it was all those years ago at the beginning of that particular journey of wonders, I found myself in deeply mixed feelings this week ... grateful to see 45 years old especially when considering that I have survived two bouts of Covid and one of anemia in the last four years, in the midst of grief so heavy at times that I understand what it is for the character in Strauss "Der Einsame" to be ringed around with grief so deep and dark that it is tight around one's heart.
All of it is behind me, and I have all this space I didn't expect in front of me.
And then I was surprised by the bass I didn't expect -- Jerome Hines, my first classical bass favorite! -- with a reminder:
Sometimes we have to start again at the beginning ... this is one of my father's favorite songs, and my parents went right along the line Mr. Hines would in explaining, since all of us share the same devout Christian faith: the One Who calls us has said, "I will never leave you, nor forsake you." Thus, "You'll Never Walk Alone" is something I have known since childhood. It is another thing, 40 years later, to become sure of it, with all other easy opportunities for close companionship stripped away.
But indeed, this is uncharted territory ... a truly new horizon ...
"And, Frau Mathews, it is quite all right to look around and rest for a moment of celebration before doing what you always do and get off into it."
The ethereal bass I expected -- the Ghost of Musical Greatness Past -- materialized with a smile.
"I will say first that I was kidding a little with you last week -- you carry on for my birthday because I enjoy that, being the big hilarious bass that I am! I know you are not of that mind, and, because you pour so much into those you are responsible to, you do not need or want anyone in your space who does not add to the peace and rest. I understand the assignment."
I smiled.
"You are barely hanging on to the appearance of 55 years old, though," I said.
"Well, I am in very great joy -- alles gute zum Geburtstag, Frau Mathews -- happy birthday!"
He had a surprise for me ...
"You recently saw a memorial about me and found out I was another one of those guitar-playing young men of the 60s -- kind of," he said.
"Kind of," I said. "The cello I knew about -- the guitar surprised me! Your hands are so large that must have been a huge guitar!"
"Prepare to be even more surprised, Frau Mathews. I did not often sing in English, but, to new horizons ... I have practiced a particular song this week."
A guitar materialized in his huge hands, and he played the most overdone D7 introductory chord ...
"Oh no you did not just imitate what I do on the piano to start 'Happy Birthday!'" I said.
"Wait a minute -- the piano has eight octaves -- I need to add these harmonics --."
And this ethereal individual added another D7 arpeggio in harmonics and had me rolling laughing before actually serenading me on "Happy Birthday" after this introduction:
"I was inspired in my interpretation today by a certain African American contralto who, finding that there was nothing else she could do for her own dearest beloved in his ill health on his birthday, reached out with this common gem of a song in unaccompanied simplicity ... common as it is, in the voice of true love, it has amazing depth and potential that has not often been explored. I hope that I can faithfully echo back the inspiration."
"Listen, it's not fair to have me in tears before you start singing."
"There is nothing fair about love, Frau Mathews ... that is a matter of grace."
Of course I could not record it for us at Q-Inspired because his infrasonic undertones are just deadly to everyday recording equipment, but I can describe it ... a guitar is tuned such that the easiest major key to play in is G, and that lined up beautifully with his high D at the top of the song ... and if he had wanted to, he did not have to stay in that "simple" one-octave range since he could sing across four. Yet he chose the path of humility, and brought all the golden glory of the high half of his voice with the mastery of his technique to the song as it was written, playing along on the guitar in a manner reminiscent of a gentle waltz ... and indeed, he carried me quite away on it, for it was time to go ...
"Hey! Y'all -- get down here -- Herr Altesrouge is serenading his beloved for her birthday in the near meadows of Golden Gate Park, and if we could just get past these trees --."
People never remember to look up, or the members of the fan base converging on the spot might have seen us on Cloud 9 above them, but we were soon over the treeline anyhow and gone ...
"To new horizons, meine Liebe!"
Over the treeline, over my beloved Buena Vista Hill to the south ... a quick touchdown while a passing classic trolley attracted the eyes ...
... and there we were at the foot of Mission Dolores Park, which I had passed for decades going here and there but never explored.
"To new horizons, meine Liebe!" he repeated.
"I first must thank you for the lovely song ... danke schön," I said.
"Gern geschehen, Frau Mathews," he purred. "Es freut mich ... it joyed me!"
He was radiantly happy, and his voice was just ringing such that passers-by were doing double-takes and smiling ... and then a triple take, because I was a foot shorter, so they caught me smiling back last!
"Now, I had to bring you to a hill," he purred, "because you ran me up and down and all over these hills in 2023, 2024, and 2025, and turnabout is fair play!"
"Really? This is what we're doing in 2026?" I said, and he started laughing.
"Oh, I'm not even warmed up yet," he purred. "It is a good thing your birthday is so early in the year!"
"So let me see if I understand -- you were only kidding me a little bit last week. You plan to spread the carrying on over the whole year?"
"Now you understand," he said, and started rubbing his hands together. "Please note that there two Dandelion Chocolate shops near here for future reference, also!"
"Was?" I said, and he grinned.
"What, you ask -- was, du fragst, meine liebe Dame? Long have I awaited this day, this year, and this moment in your life, Frau Mathews ... long have I awaited the permission I received on high today to echo this: Now I have you just where I want you!"
I knew there was an echo in here ... I knew it was coming... there was no escape, and at last, no possible pull from behind me to make me think I would be abandoning responsibility to be move forward ... so I sighed, took a moment to acknowledge the grief of the past, and then looked up to see my companion offering his arm, and to be touched deeply by the look of his relief -- he was humble enough to not assume I would give in easily.
"It did take a long time for us to get here," I said. "I thank you for echoing the patience on high so well."
"It has been my duty, and my honor -- and today, it has become my pleasure!" he said, and then echoed the joy with the glorious radiance of his smile -- and then his voice as we went up the hill because --
"We finally have you in the boat, Frau Mathews, away from the affairs of your past, and from here, it does not matter so much where we land -- there is no blessed isle, but it is a blessed world, so we may look to be blessed wherever we land!"
So of course he burst into "Selige Welt," and it seemed to be on another level as we went up and he looked down at me contentedly on his arm ... a brief preview of just how high his joy would later become...
Mission Dolores Park is an interesting place in that there is no street behind it, just a trolley route, meaning that once one gets high enough up, even though in one of the densest and busiest areas of the city, the noise of the city falls away. It is a little while before the terrain drops off...
... and from that point it is all glory.
It was a beautiful morning -- this was not a walk I would have done in the afternoon because Mission Dolores Park is crowded on every sunny day, so in no previous year would I have done it. But indeed, to new horizons!
We walked up the side of the hill to a bench ...
... and sat there in the bright sun very happily after taking in the glorious view behind us.
It was a moment that the last movement of Beethoven's 6th symphony describes well -- after all the storms, at last into the sunlight, in grateful, peaceful joy ... this is a hymn of thanks, instrumentally considered. My mind played around with what the words would have been if Bach had heard it and said, "That would make a fine chorale ... Wir danken, wir danken, wir dankin dir, O Gott ..." Maybe something like that... simple enough for shepherds to sing it in the field..
(
At some point it hit me while I was putting words to that melody ... years 35-44 were rough. One major injury that cost me a year of my life and nearly the use of my leg -- I was not supposed to recover -- two surgeries, two bouts with anemia, two bouts with Covid, walking away from 95 percent of the people I knew and loved that did not age out ... as a mentor and my grand old soldier hung on as long as they could before age and illness took them from my life last year, as age also at last overtook my parents ...
So many deaths ... so many letdowns from people and organizations and my own nation ... so many battles against evil attacking my community from without, but also within ... so many great but costly victories ... all I could do was keep going, keep climbing, believing that the One Who called me had power to keep me if I just kept going ...
I made it to age 45 anyway, with most of the battles behind me, recovering in earnest from the worst of it all, and those victories bearing fruit even while my nation experiments with reverting to its worst behaviors.
I remembered then the song by Kurt Carr that I recalled after recovering from the second bout of Covid ... when you know that you know that YOU KNOW you could not have made it on your own, and you count up all the reasons why, all that can be said to the Lord is "For This I Give You Praise"!
Now, Beethoven 6th and Kurt Carr back to back in the golden sunshine of a winter morning that is one's birthday when having that kind of recollection ... that can have one caught up, but I'm not a shouter ... I will quietly sit and thanks and praise and worship and more and more feel the presence of the Lord in terms of "I'm here, and you're welcome -- you know I love you!" and thus reach a transport of joy that my body simply cannot do anything but put me to sleep so I can start breathing normally again and not actually leave this world for nothing but that joy, ever more... not yet, anyhow!
My Echo Watchman for the day at Mission Dolores Park understood his assignment, gathering me up as I became overwhelmed and began to leave consciousness.
"Rest in joy -- I have you!"
I do not know how long it took me to come around, but the sensation of him taking my pulse was notable ... he remembered that a year before this while I was anemic, had my blood oxygen gotten low enough, I might not have come around, and he was concerned about me. What was notable was what someone had said about him online: his thumb alone was pretty close to the size of my wrist, to say nothing of his massive hand compared with mine -- which was also about how much his voice outsized mine as well, so, all the way around, he had to be very gentle ... and he was, carefully closing just his second finger around my wrist without squeezing while covering my whole hand with his. His voice was likewise very gentle.
"Sie is stark genug, aber sie hat noch nicht gefrühstückt..."
Indeed I had gotten out very early that day, and although my pulse and therefore I was strong enough, but I still had not breakfasted yet, the noch combining the ideas of still and yet. Him being a proper German, that concerned him ...
"Aber ich kann sie jetzt nicht allein lassen ... und dieser Park wird langsam überfüllt."
But I cannot leave her right now ... and this park is becoming crowded.
He gathered me up carefully, and got up ... way up ... like a Mannheim Rocket that Mozart used in the last movement of his lovely 20th piano concerto ....
We caught Cloud 9 right back over the hills into Golden Gate Park to a quiet way with brightness above it ...
.... a brightness that increased ...
... and then gave way to a view ...
.. distantly lit with calla lily lamps in the midday light ...
... lighting the way down to Alvord Lake in fresh winter clarity!
But once we got there, he was not satisfied, because ...
"Hier im Schatten ist es zu kalt, und jeder Talgrund ist eine Kältefalle."
Here in the shade it was too cold, and although I wouldn't think about cold sinks as a mild-winter-loving San Franciscan, it is true and something a German would know meant life or death: the bottom of every valley -- Talgrund, the valley floor -- is a cold sink. Alvord Lake is at the bottom of a valley between Lone Mountain and Sutro Greenbelt, and indeed at the lowest point -- it is where the cold air settles, and the last place to warm up.
Now in San Francisco on a sunny winter day even in the shade, this was really not a problem, but, to a German, better safe than sorry.
So he turned around, and I opened my eyes to see him smiling.
"Da ist der Platz für mein goldenes Blumenkind."
There is the spot for my Golden Flower Child...
He carried me up and sat me down, and smiled when he saw me seriously waking up.
"I knew the kiss of the sun would wake you up, mein goldenes Blumenkind."
"All I can say is thank you -- Vielen Dank," I said.
"I am just getting started!" he said, and handed me a little bottle of water. "I am treating you to breakfast, immediately!"
He waited until I had drunk half that water, and then went to get breakfast, and I tell you it is something to see when a big man is doing a double-time stride and you can read the determination on your behalf in his step! He did not go far, because his immense and joyful laughter carried right across the street ... I just drank water and gave thanks and prepared to give more thanks ... and he brought me the nicest little salad, combining my love of Asian/Middle Eastern food with a solid German-type salad underneath-- bring on the pickled veggies and fresh mixed lettuces as the foundation!
"I am not finished yet!"
So off he went, and this ethereal individual found me a sweet bar packed with peanut butter and cranberries and oats ...
... because he remembered that I had to build up my muscles again to get back to walking the way I had in 2024, and he had loaded me with protein.
"Awwwwwwwwww ... as much as you fuss about me overdoing ... ."
"And I have learned you are going to do it anyway, mein Eisenblumenkind, so I will have to build you up and also subtly pace you while distracting you with my charm," he said. "You know how you young Americans say never trust a big bass and a smile?"
I had to put my food down to laugh.
"It's 'never trust a big butt and a smile!'"
"Oh ... well, you know how things got lost in translation, Frau Mathews."
"Do you ever stop finding ways to be perfectly ridiculous?" I said as I laughed.
"Other men actually have charm; I have to work with what I have."
He had to hold my food so I could roll laughing, and waited until I recovered before speaking again.
"It amazes me how you do those redemption upgrades in English, telling people to mess around and find out, and 'situation normal, all fouled up,' and my favorite, 'K-I-S-S: Keep it simple, sweetheart,' because although you may think a whole lot of people are stupid, you would never say that to them! You have rubbed off on me, Frau Mathews!"
"You were known as kind and soft-spoken also, in a language as well known for its earthiness as English," I said.
"More well known," he said. "German's roots are so much older! But when you have a voice like this, one has to be careful."
"I understand completely," I said. "I was at the store the other day, and someone remembered my voice two decades later ... one does not want to leave a deep, profound impression of a curse upon people over that long a period of time."
"No indeed, my darling contralto profondo," he said. "I was famous on top of everything else in my mortal life, so imagine the conversation: 'He has such a singing voice, but in person... .'"
"A life of integrity is demanding," I said. "When you know you can just end folks with your voice ... or bless them ... one has to choose."
"The second choice is so rewarding," he said. "So rewarding, Frau Mathews ... when you can live your life as a blessing ... and you are just now 45, and you already are decades into the path ... oh, Frau Mathews ... the way it will unfold to you ... I can hardly contain my excitement for you on this your birthday!"
It was a good thing the sun was so bright, and the ginkgo we were sitting under still had gold ... he was glowing up dramatically.
"It is January," he purred, "and I love that your birthday is in January because I can spread my carrying on out all year!"
I sighed, but smiled, and laid my head into that massive chest ...
"Yes -- ja, ich bin bereit, I am ready," I said. "All I can say is thank you."
He forgot he no longer had a physical heart to burst from such emotion, and I forgot that if he forgot, I was going to have the living daylights slapped out of me because his hand was immense and my head was in the way. Sure enough, he cried out softly, and his immense hand went to his chest -- but he remembered just in the nick of time that my head was there. He then literally shook as he thought of the mistake he had nearly made -- and then became very still as I leaned my forehead into his still-trembling hand.
"It is my mistake too -- we are only human," I said. "I'll put my head on your shoulder, next time."
I moved my head and rested there ... and just waited as relief bubbled out of him in laughter but was just the beginning because he started getting over the octaves in peal after peal like great deep golden bells in array ... he was overjoyed and approaching the verge of ecstasy, rapidly ...
"Ach, meine liebe Dame, mein geliebtes, goldenes Blumenkind, mein Schatz, meine Herrin ... ach, ich muss mein Englisch finden..."
"Nehmen Sie sich Zeit," I said gently. "Take your time."
He looked at me with a face full of unspeakable gratitude and love, and then closed his eyes and concentrated for a long moment.
"Time is the one thing do not have," he said, "for I must sing -- so long have I waited, with the immortal love back of me, pressing me so intensely for you ... Frau Mathews, you do not know, far beyond my personal affection for you, how much there is back and above me, and what a wonderful, agonizing privilege of patience I have learned under such a weight of glory, waiting for you to be ready and healed enough to give me room, Frau Mathews! And now -- at last -- at last --!"
That last "last" was already an F4 -- he just went up there and nailed it like he was a baritone as his glowing up became ridiculous -- and then, he stopped traffic for four minutes, singing in such a state!
I kind of felt bad for his fanbase ... imagine being in the quarter-mile around, and having only four minutes to figure out how to get to your favorite accessible bass-in-the-park to find out who exactly has him singing at traffic-stopping intensity about how he has gloriously suffered, waiting for the decision of the lady -- Herrin, after all -- from whose eyes he has seen a light that has changed his life -- he can go no further on the journey thus revealed by that light unless she decide she will go with him -- and the music at the end suggests she went on and said "Ja, ich bin bereit"...
Forget Cloud 9 and Cloud 99 ... he was messing up three entire dimensions of the universe by the time he hit the peak of that song, and so time, space, and matter were done with him and knew it was my fault, so they put us out into the Knockout Zone forthwith, to sit under a black midnight spangled with the Milky Way for light, streaked with fiery golden meteors ... like tears of fire -- of overjoyed passion!
"Thank you so much," he said to me as the music played out. "Danke schön ... danke schön, meine Herrin, danke, dass du mir Raum gibst, dich zu lieben."
Then he looked up and began to give thanks at a pace that my German was not adequate to keep up with ... but I did gather that he was having a flashback of his long mortal life, and the privilege of leaving a legacy of love that had extended beyond it, and thus came back to me ... but then disappeared shortly thereafter as his overjoy and resultant singing of praise would reach a volume that could only be contained at home on high. By that time, those meteors had become an intense shower of fire, and they continued to increase for some time yet ... but I went to sleep waiting there in the beautiful, warm, golden quiet ... the Knockout Zone, after all, was ideal for that.
I woke up on the sunny side of Alvord Lake, some time later, still resting with my head on his shoulder... all of the excitement of the previous hours was over, and, even on my birthday, there were things in the afternoon that I still needed to do.
"I must see you home, of course, Frau Mathews."
He was still overjoyed, the timbre of his voice still shimmering and brimming full, his eyes burning like those golden meteors, but his voice was calmly settled in its beautiful middle range, for now the task was to get me home. It was a lovely walk, right up to the door.
"Alles gute zum Geburstag, meine liebe Dame," he said softly.
"Danke schön," I said.
"Danke schön," he said, and then walked down the stairs, and missed the last six ... he literally was walking on air for a little while.
"You know if you keep ticking gravity off," I kidded him, "you're not going to be able to do anything this year around here."
He turned around in mid-air, set his jaw, and touched down.
"Hardly," he said, his voice firm. "I am not finished -- I have not yet even begun!"
The next day, I got to work and the boardroom was full of flowers again -- deep blue in the background, but progressively lightening toward the front through violet, lavender, pink, red, orange, and gold at the center -- a sunrise painted in the language of flowers. There was a card -- the arrangement had a name.
"To New Horizons."
The handwriting was distinct ... inflected slightly by Sütterlin, Germany's last form of native cursive ... some village child's parents may not have known, or simply defied, orders to not teach it given in 1941. It was a subtle tell of the author's age and nationality that was distinct ... but everyone else in the office just oohed and aahed and enjoyed and everyone who wanted to take home some flowers did ... blessed all around ... my type of birthday gift, anyhow!
As I went to bed, I heard an echo ... and knowing Who was back of him, his voice was the echo of an echo that came all the way out of eternity... it is a true new horizon when one climbs free of all the noise and wreckage and even desire to fix what cannot be fixed, and finds there is more room to be given to love in one's life, even as one lives as a loving blessing to others as much as possible ...
I am glad you have made ready -- from here, to new horizons!