Illumination

These days I am so full of feelings. It’s as if someone has turned a dial to amplify my emotions — good and bad. I feel them reverberate more deeply within myself. Moments of love and joy make me soar and tingle. Moments of pain and sorrow make my chest ache and tears pour uncontrollably. I feel my feelings more fully.

Last night I caught a ferry to Circular Quay. I saw the Vivid Sydney  lights turn a city already bright and dazzling into an amplified version of itself – all colour and movement. Flickering patterns, spotlights, imagery illuminating this city on the water. I drank champagne in a bar then went to a Sufjan Stevens gig at the Opera House – a birthday present to myself.

 I woke this morning still thinking about the music – the experience of the concert. Five musicians moving about the stage, playing an array of instruments, and Sufjan Stevens’ incredible vocals. More lights and imagery beamed onto panels hanging like stained glass windows behind the musicians, and all of it illuminating a dialogue on life and death I feel as though I have been having with myself in various guises these past ten months. It was mind-bendingly, heart-soaringly good. I feel so privileged to have been there; to have experienced this moment of internal illumination. Sometimes, when the emotions are running high, it seems it doesn’t hurt to turn the dial a little louder.