The Curator

3 a.m.

I rise from the architecture that is us, from the sleep foundation we've duplicated over ten thousands times now, to stand beside the bed and look down at my wife.

Once again, I have been lured from her side by the stiffest competition she has for my devotion. And once again, there will be no deliberation. I have heard and now must heed the summons from my muse.

I leave the bedroom without turning on any lights, guided by a faith that comes with familiarity. I needn't worry about waking my wife because I know her well. She will undoubtedly stir from her slumber, note both my absence and the time, then curl back into her croissant of covers and return to those dreams where women go, I suppose.

Yet true to form, this woman, my wife, just hours ago reaffirmed a selfless attitude toward her own dreams. It is this quality which seals my fate with her.

Last night, we were blessed beyond measure after we picked up a scratch-off lottery ticket as an afterthought at a convenience store. That impromptu purchase parlayed five dollars into twenty thousand dollars.

What did my wife do later as we discussed how to spend our newfound fortune? Did she mention travels to tropical destinations, complete with feasts bookended by exotic charcuterie and fine wines? Or did she speak of midnight dances on cooling sands, the stars a veritable ticker-tape parade for our celebration?

Quite the contrary. She not only suggested but insisted that I use our windfall to pursue one of my own dreams. Something I had revealed to her during one of our first dates, back when we had no idea that our budding romance would evolve into a twenty-seven year adventure.

Now I find myself in the middle of a darkened living room and pacing, tracing constellations in the carpet. Normally, I would carry on like this until I stumbled over an epiphany somewhere between Capricorn and Sagittarius. But this morning's routine is different and I am engrossed instead with calculations in my head.

So. Twenty thousand dollars.

First I will have to surrender a portion to one of the two certainties in life. Five thousand dollars for Uncle Sam should cover the taxes.

Then, supplies. I'll need two hundred and fifty notebooks. Amazon sells Moleskine's Classic Expanded version for twenty bucks a pop. These will be large enough to accommodate a year's worth of one-page journal entries with plenty to spare for those exceedingly wordy days. Ideal for my purpose.

Ten thousand dollars spent, ten thousand to go.

For the final subtraction, I will contact high school English teachers throughout the state and ask if they would like to have their classes considered for my contest. Once recruited, these teachers may nominate their most gifted students who will then be assigned one of the notebooks. The number of entrants selected from each school will, of course, be dependent on the number of participating districts.

Next comes the fun part. I'll travel to each group that has qualified and present the details of the contest. Pretty simple, really. The students will be asked to write in their notebooks daily for one year, to create a single page that chronicles their thoughts on that given day.

I want to instill in them a love for words and for the magic those words can produce. I want them filled with the curiosity of the spelunker and the hope for treasures that only a grotto of perfect nouns and verbs can reveal.

As for incentive, well, that's where the other ten grand comes in. I figure five thousand dollars for first place, three thousand for second, and a thousand each for third and fourth place. So we'll call it a small scholarship program, the only stipulation being that the monies are applied toward tuition or textbooks at the college of their choice.

My investment, so I get to be 'da judge. A time-consuming project, to be sure, but I'm confident it will be well worth it and there will be miracles embedded within the mundane. It's the minds and imaginations of those miracle creators that I'm after.

So. Twenty thousand dollars. This is my plan and it pleases me.

I return to our bedroom and stand once more at the side of the bed. My wife's hair spills out from under the blankets like slow silk, her breathing slower and silkier still.

God, I love this woman.

There will be another time for ocean cruises, extravagant feasts, and dances on the beach. But I'm persuaded that life is not so much about the shores we reach as the waters we traverse.

Oh, one last thing. I'll need to keep my own notebook, an index that includes a synopsis for each of the entries in the contest. Not a mysterious black book, but rather a ship's log of sorts for the voyage I am about to embark upon.

Tomorrow, I sail. But this morning, with the structures in our neighborhood dormant and their occupants contentedly asleep, I slip quietly back into the architecture that is us.