From “Luminary” Millennium The Journal of Alex Ventoux:

“There are forces acting upon us with or without our consent. Forces sure of themselves as gravity. I thought knowing myself with the same certainty would keep me safe but surprise! As they say, what a long strange trip this has been.”

“You’ll want to know why it happened, and I can’t say. But I do know when. It was that moment when I turned my back on everything and felt peace.”

“Alaska. I was never quite honest with you why I came back here. I could never quite explain, but I’ll try now while I still can. It happened on the cruise we took through Prince Edward Sound. I was looking at the water and the mountains which were beautiful of course, but for a moment up on the deck of that ship I could swear it wasn’t just an incredibly realistic simulation. Not just the scenery, my whole life, then back home the feeling never left, all junior and senior year while I studied, ran track, filled out college applications. I returned here to find my life again. I had too.

I don’t quite understand what draws me on but that’s ok because God doesn’t move us by telling us the facts, he moves us by pains and contradictions. He’s given me a lack of understanding, not answers, but questions, an invitation to marvel. And here, for the first time, I have. I never thought it would end like this, I never thought it would end at all, but like they say, what a long strange trip this has been.”

“My leg is broken, I’ve lost alot of blood. Starting to rain and I know I’ll never make it home. Someday some kid will tell Ian, “you’re an idiot just like your brother who threw his life away, walked into the woods and DIED.” I’m asking you, as a last favor, to put a better spin on it for him. You two and Ian, you have always been real. Please konw I love you, I’m thinking of you in the end, and I’m looking at the stars.

“We are meant to be here.
We step from one peiece of holy ground to the next under stars that ask, imagine for one second you could drop in on a past life. What would you like to find yourself doing there? What would charm you, make you proud? Then the question of what to do in this life becomes so simple it’s terryfying. Just to do that thning that would charm you, that would make you say, yes, this is the real me. Do that, and you’re alive. Alex Ventoux.”

* * *“I don’t know where to look for answers anymore.”
“I don’t read my horoscope but I think know exactly where to look: anywhere that makes you conscious of the part you play.”