Lately we feel we’ve been looking at ourselves a little differently in the mirror. It’s a subtle change — but it seems we’re needing something different from our reflection. Our gaze lasts a little longer, perhaps it’s deeper. Feels almost like a looking through, not the typical perusal, the one that assesses or investigates for the latest aging or oversights. It seems almost existential — not depressively so, just something like well, here we are. Maybe without the gaze of others (friends and strangers alike) a rudimentary confirmation of our existence is lacking. And nothing in this world can be empty — if something moves something else slides in— always seamlessly. Looking out the window tonight there is a very distant red light blinking slowly, right where the black line of trees meets the brighter sky. Perhaps it’s the top of an antennae or the apex of a tall building. Whatever the case, this red pulse also has an existential aura, pulsing like a solitary sinoatrial node, performing another type of mirror image.