This afternoon, I went into Powell's on the Four Corners, which sells music instruments and sheets on the bottom floor and paint, sketchbooks, calligraphy sets, and more on the next floor up. I must have spent an hour in there, feeling papers, comparing oil colours, and pondering the arcane classification of pencils. I was serene for once, as if this small intimate space full of possibility was all there was in the world. The present felt like a source of luxury, comfort, and peace, rather than of anxiety and fear; in its future awaited the scratching of a nib, and the wisdom of directly observed nature.




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