Equestrian Fantasy

I step out from the secure self-enclosure of my Equestrian home, and the morning sun rewards me with a blurry, spotted vision of beauty.

I live atop a hill in the rolling plains outside the city of Marathon. It is springtime, and a patchwork blanket of wild green plants punctuated by deciduous trees and highlighted with streaks of yellow and white flowers unfolds below me and stretches to the horizon. The grassy scent in the wind is invigorating; a challenge to live worthily and bear the fruit of goodness. Birds' whistles and trills force me to smile.

It's always hard, at a moment when you're overwhelmed by the presence of goodness in the world, and imagine that the gratitude you ought to feel toward the beauty of the universe would be life-changing if only you could be honest and consistent enough to allow yourself to embrace it—it's hard to accept your own limitations at such times, and not become depressed at the prospect of so much wonder washing over you ineffectually, like a storm of purifying rain draining harmlessly off of a rooftop and down the gutters into the dirt, leaving the inside of the house unaffected and dry as ever.

I notice a pair of bees servicing a flowering vine that has snaked itself partway up a wall of my home. The bees remind me of one of the friends I've made since coming to Equestria: a beekeeper, a gorgeous gold-and-orange mare with cascading tiers of mane and tail hair that would have equally well suited a hellenistic Greek lady. I recall the work I've done for her in the past, and think of the work I am headed out to do today.

I think I can say without any reservations that, if there is a heaven, there will be work for humans to do there. There's something about work, something about directing your body, mind, and will together towards a single, unified, good purpose, that fulfills a need deep within the human spirit. For it's very difficult to put yourself wholeheartedly into some physical, skilled work and at the same time be stingy, nurture petty grudges, worry yourself needlessly about the future, or get depressing ideas. Ideas that you are spiritually separated from everyone else in a way that makes you radically alone in the universe. Ideas that you, as imperfect and vice-ridden as you are, are still generally better than most everyone else in the world. No, a day of hard work gives the lie to those and many other mischievous temptations, and afterwards at night, your sleep is sound and dreamless.

At least, that's how I see it. I feel that I can see a lot of things now that I had passed over when I was on Earth. But the spectre of the rising sun in Equestria, that great illuminative work of steadfast love that the Princess gives us all from her bounty of strength every day, has a certain magical way of casting old ideas in a new, transformative light.