blindness earlier.
steely determination now.

the st hugh's website states categorically:
men over 45 are not accepted.
I'm too late of course.
[I knew this already].
but then I thought:
it had to be this way;
there was no other way:
in 2000 I wasn't ready:
not by a long chalk.
I had things to learn the hard way
and I still didnt understand what it was to be loved.
now I do.
now I am ready and this is how it must be.
the other thing I learnt (the hard way) was that faith isn't a luxury:
it's not a gift but a necessity for ordinary life.
without it there is distortion and a misunderstanding of fundamental things: both of others and perhaps above all of time.
without faith life becomes [for me at least] a continual yearning for yesterday.
I also learnt that faith is not something one simply has,
it's something that one asks for each day.
rather in the way one breathes in air perhaps . . . . .