M

<M__> I remember a night some time ago... I was on a road of another kind.
<M__> I was late, but for what seems to elude me now.
<M__> I came upon a man at one point.
<M__> He was just standing. Motionless.
<M__> I could see him from minutes away. Looking off at what I could not tell.
<M__> As I approached him, I reached all kinds of conclusions about who he was. About what he might be waiting for.
<M__> By the time I was seconds from him, I knew him at some level. Had formed memories with him that never happened.
<M__> Yet in those seconds, I saw that he was not a man. Not in the way I expected, or even the way you probably envisioned him yourself.
<M__> Where there should have been hands, there was only straw. Where there should have been feet, there was only cloth.
<M__> Here was a device set for creatures much slower than myself.
<M__> And there I was, afraid. Not of the man, but of myself.
<M__> On that path, that man stood for something.
<M__> At an intimate distance, he could not be said to even closely resemble that for which he stood. Least of all to me in that moment.
<M__> So it is with many markers on many paths.
<M__> On yours, for instance...
<M__> an 18 could really be an 18.
<M__> Or it could be a 6.
<M__> Of all the gifts I have been given, those of the mathematic in nature were never among them.
<M__> But straw men are another matter.
<M__> 18 is 6. Identify the other straw men. Line them up. Come to what is mine.
<M__> Good luck.