"I feel," said Jacob, "like a man who has spent his entire life swimming through a vast body of water. When I was younger and raised my head from my effort, the horizon seemed to forever disappear into the distance. That horizon, before me, no longer grows more distant. It has, in some ways, drawn closer. But what I have discovered is that the water beneath me is deeper than I have ever known."

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"Yes," said Samuel, letting his head drop to his chest. "Life has depths that only time explores."

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"And time," said Jacob, once again beginning to stack the bakery boards, "time does not wait for us to learn every lesson before it moves on to the next."

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-Jacob's Ladder-