Back to the studies—looking at finals straight in the face. She won’t blink if finals won’t. She sipped her coffee through her teeth and let the flavor bathe her mouth in citrus and nuts… it tastes like Christmas.

But this year, Christmas is postponed. One never has Christmas until after finals are over. It made her miss that small respite between college and grad school, when she worked—wrote for the most mundane newsletter one could think up—but had nights and weekends free.

That year, she celebrated Christmas early.

This year, she listens to iTunes Christmas lounge while reading about women in the early Church.

What’s wrong with theology? How come the people with the most faith know nothing of our history as a Christian church?

A jaded person would think that faith is easiest when one stays ignorant of the facts. But when one really thinks about the facts—the vastness of space, the miracle of life—one has to take those on faith too. Because life is full of miracles, explained and unexplained.

A jaded person would also suspect every guy who talks to her of being married with a couple kids, but looking for a fling.

She was turning into a jaded person.

“Facts are fun,” she told herself as she sorted through 100 pages of type-written notes. “Why didn’t I go for something like musical theater?”

Then the thought, “How come people come out of theaters saying, ‘How true, how true,’ when it was completely fictional, but when they read anything religious, they say, ‘That’s silly’? Isn’t it quite a similar situation?”

Suddenly a great meteor, larger than anyone had seen for centuries, slammed into the tiny shop, killing everyone inside immediately.

In that moment of consciousness that we are all allowed before the pages close upon the chapter we call life, she thought, “I am so glad I had that last cup of coffee.”