But time is our friend as well as our enemy. In that great sea of memory, time collapses and we are all together in that place where time doesn't exist. We can be quiet and see our worlds collide. The old become young again; the children grow up and have new children. The dead return to hike and fish. Our grandchildren go crawling into the laps of our great-grandparents. We are all at the table. We can see everything. We can talk to one another. The lake is calm.

                --Mary Pipher (1947- ), prelude, Another Country: Navigating the Emotional Terrain of Our Elders