The days are getting shorter. That is just how fast it happens. For six months, they get longer, and for six months, they return to darkness before 5:00 P.M. We have reached the top of the Slide and soon will slide down until just before Christmas. Often, life is hurry-up-and-wait. First, we want to become older. The key to happiness and knowledge is with age. Certainly, the adults had a secret language they spoke to each other. The quirky look in their eyes revealed their mysterious intent. The agenda was hidden. We were the little people. We were kept in the dark. Once we had the reins of power, all would be different and well. We were princes and princesses in exile waiting to be returned to our sovereign thrones. We saw the cracks in the leaders and would not make the same mistake.

First, we discovered there was no manual for growing up. What looked like a good idea at 20 seemed bizarre at 40. Deadlines and exercises in financial management. Take the kids to practice. Dental appointments and new furnaces to buy. More months than money. The throne we imagined in our youth seemed to be moving away from us. We wanted to solve the world’s problems, but first there was grocery shopping. Relationships go from easy to hard and back to easy again. We see the top of the slide, but the handles are hot, and we almost fall in the midst of our ascent.

The Old Man mused that he would watch the nature of the Slide. He would see who succeeded and who did not. Was it bluster and fury or slow and steady that won the climb to the zenith?

‘Follow me, and I will make you rich, and perhaps you will find time to fish for women and men,’ the Evangelist said. ‘God has given me the answer, the power of positive thinking,’ the Evangelist continued. ‘If you believe you can do it, you can do it,’ the Evangelist noted. ‘Miracles are contemplated in your mind,’ he continued. ‘If you want to sell vacuum cleaners, believe you can sell vacuum cleaners,’ the Evangelist proclaimed! Becoming rich is the visible evidence of God’s blessing on your prosperous life,’ the New York Evangelist noted.

So the time moves much faster as you slide down Earth’s Slide. Some learn what the experience was about, while others are mystified. Some old folks are laughing all the way down, while others are angry that they did not obtain the throne they imagined in their youth.