I will be away for a little while, off for the holidays to my mother’s house near Irvine, to Phoenix for a Bahá’í conference and then to Tucson for a friend’s wedding, and to see the wonderful people there. And after that, I will be teaching a Persian class at the Bosch Bahá’í School, in Santa Cruz. So the next entry may not come until after January 12. Meanwhile, as I watch the wet and windy world pass by my windows, driving up and down I-280 to visit my brother and sister, I wonder if all that I see is not the material form of some question: of God’s asking, “Do you love me?” Because the nature of God, as the best and most wonderful of all things, makes me think of those movies where a rich and beautiful woman, trying to find a good and sincere husband, makes herself seem poor and less desirable in order to learn the man’s true motives. Can he love her for who she is, or would he be too dazzled by her qualities, and not himself know why he liked her? Or perhaps it is like the brilliant genius, whom no one can properly understand because they don’t share a similar mind. In his or her search for friends, he is forced to seek out those willing to love him without demands — because otherwise they would never accept him for who he is, but rather who they think he should be. In both of these scenarios, the main character wants the fellowship of a true friend: not someone who wants only what they can offer, or is attracted only to how they appear in a certain light. Each uses a kind of “filter” to screen out the false from the true, and to identity those capable of loving despite brilliance, and empathizing without the need to understand. If our world is such a filter, it would mean that love is the way to step through the veil. Then all that I see, all the variations and extremes of high and low, are but the aspects of a single Light, seen through that veil. All of which ask the question, “Can you love Me as I am?” Because only if I can say “Yes” to all of this, can I say yes to Whomever is behind it. Which proposes a different meaning for heaven and hell: The one being like the man who learns that the plain but lovely person he fell in love with is in fact the Queen of the land; or the other being the discovery that the one he turned down was, in fact, everything he had assumed she wasn’t. For once the veil is lifted, it is impossible to choose again sincerely. Happy holidays to everyone! I wish you much joy, and happy times, with your families and friends — wherever and whomever you are!