Winter
Eternity is not something that begins after you are dead. It is going on all the time. We are in it now. - Charlotte Perkins Gilman
They think that I'm 'not always all there' these days. Perhaps they are right. I prefer to spend the remainder of my days remembering the adventures of my youth. Back to the days when life was more than being cared for by kindly strangers and being visited by loved ones every day.
If being lost in the past sometimes makes me unaware of the present at times, what of it? No one knows better than I do that my days are numbered. One hundred and seventy-seven years is a respectable life span by anyone's standards. I can sense that my time to part ways with this feeble body is fast approaching. It is only natural that I should look back on my life and take stock of my accomplishments and failures, is it not?
I have left my mark on the world – the Wizarding World, anyway – for good or ill. One never knows how one's decisions and actions in life will affect the world generations afterward. My progeny are many, and are a comfort to me. When I am missing my beloved wife, who was taken from me after only seventy short years, I have only to look at my children, or their children. I can see her face, or eyes, or hair in so many of them. She will live on in them, just as I will.
It is no different when I long to see my best friend again. His children and grandchildren come to see me when they can, and they never fail to remind me of him, with their looks or manners. They come and listen to my stories, and laugh with me over the antics of our youth.
And when my reminiscing comes to an end, and I am left facing the future, I can't help but wonder what adventures lie ahead of me. Will I be young again, in the next life? Will my body be strong and my mind sharp? Will my white hair be red again, and my rheumy eyes return to clear blue?
Will Hermione be there waiting for me? And Harry?
I can't wait to find out.
End.
