This is my third attempt at writing something. Usually I feel that typing something out and then deleting it is like cheating. If you were talking to someone out loud you couldn't just undo what you've said - so why should you edit your thoughts elsewhere? Still, I couldn't leave an entry full of half thoughts and questions that no one would want (let alone be able) to answer for me.

So here is where it starts. My entry. The real entry. Forget all that stuff above. I feel driven to writing something. When you were younger, did you ever try to see things that weren't there? When I was about 9 or 10 years old, I used to huddle under my blankets and stare out the window. I grew up in Ohio, and during the summer it was warm enough to need the windows open at night. We had screens on all the windows and doors to keep the bugs out. But I would push the screen panel away from the window and hop into bed and lay there waiting for some spark of light to try and get in. I remember one time in particular, I was waiting and I could see the deep blue of the sky and hear the wind in the tree in the backyard. I waited to see some spark of life from the outside world. I was so sure that there was something alive out there, something alive and curious and awesome. I was waiting to be struck in awe. I loved the outdoors when I was younger, I wanted to stay out and sleep on the roof of the extension. Sometimes I would climb out there and look up at the sky and feel like I was lifting up and drifting into the night...

My dad would get up in the morning and wonder why there were so many flies and moths indoors. I never 'fessed up because I was always hoping that that night, or the next night would be when I'd see it. And if anyone found out that I'd been propping the screen open, or even climbing out of the window, dad would've made sure I kept it shut.

I wasn't the kind of child that believed in fairies, or angels. But I did believe in ghosts because they seemed more plausible. I was big into ghost hunting and trying to contact spirits - to no avail. I'm still interested in stuff like that, but I'm much more cynical with a few years on me. I'm still not sure how to describe what exactly I thought I would see when I would stare at the window at night. I was sure it would be something amazing. Not necessarily something to be feared, not something to spook or befriend me. Nothing so personal. I guess I was just hoping for some sign that there was an essence of life out there that was able to be seen. Evidence of the night having some life of its own. I was so certain that it would come that one night I saw it.

It was the middle of July. It was dark outside, and warm. There was a pleasant breeze which I can almost feel now as I recall it. I had been looking out the window - missing sleep, as usual. There had been lightning bugs galore over the past week. It was fun going outside and dancing in the yard with all those little fireflies lighting up and going out. They were like slow pulsing fairy lights, free of wires and floating around, doing their own thing. So I was watching them through my window and I must have drifted off at some point - but I woke up with a start. I opened my eyes and there was this beautiful glow in front of my face. It was too close though, and I scooted back and nearly fell out of bed. For maybe a matter of seconds, I was certain that I was seeing what I'd been waiting for. This floating light that swept through my room with its rhythmic beating light... In my newly woken state I was sure that I was finally witnessing the night, alive and thrumming with energy. My heart was beating so fast and I think my eyes must have been as wide as they ever have been.

The lightning bug landed on my dresser and then eventually disappeared somewhere into my room where I couldn't find it. I hope it escaped. After those first few seconds of shock and awe, I realised it was a firefly, a lightning bug that had found its way in through the gap in the screen.

I thought about it over and over as I lay there. I finally realised that I had seen exactly what I had hoped for. That bug was a part of the night. It was a part of the outdoors, of nature. Part of the time that we cannot control, of the time we are meant to sit back and sleep, or observe but not interfere.. I had seen what I needed to see, felt what I'd needed to feel and was sure in myself that there was a truth to those feelings that, although no one could back me up and maybe no one would understand, it was good and right.

When I was a child, I tried so desperately to see something that wasn't there; now I wonder why I'd ever stopped looking.