The essay form

I think for a while, then say, "When I was last here, did I talk much about the Church of Reason?"

"Yes, you talked a lot about that."

"Did I ever talk about an individual named Phædrus?"

"No."

"Who was he?" Gennie asks.

"He was an ancient Greek -- a rhetorician -- a `composition major' of his time. He was one of those present when reason was being invented."

"You never talked about that, I don't think."

"That must have come later. The rhetoricians of ancient Greece were the first teachers in the history of the Western world. Plato vilified them in all his works to grind an axe of his own and since what we know about them is almost entirely from Plato they're unique in that they've stood condemned throughout history without ever having their side of the story told. The Church of Reason that I talked about was founded on their graves. It's supported today by their graves. And when you dig deep into its foundations you come across ghosts."

I look at my watch. It's after two. "It's a long story," I say.

"You should write all this down," Gennie says.

I nod in agreement. "I'm thinking about a series of lecture-essays...a sort of Chautauqua. I've been trying to work them out in my mind as we rode out here -- which is probably why I sound so primed on all this stuff. It's all so huge and difficult. Like trying to travel through these mountains on foot.

"The trouble is that essays always have to sound like God talking for eternity, and that isn't the way it ever is. People should see that it's never anything other than just one person talking from one place in time and space and circumstance. It's never been anything else, ever, but you can't get that across in an essay."

"You should do it anyway," Gennie says. "Without trying to get it perfect."

"I suppose," I say.