Your gentle thought about reaching Thomas stayed in my boiler as I ventured out to the neighborhood playground at twilight. Beneath the tall wooden climbing frame, I found a pile of smooth fallen birch twigs and dry spruce pine needles strewn in the soft wood chips. Moving carefully in the quiet night, I used my soft bumper to nudge the straightest twigs together, lining them up into two neat, parallel rails pointing straight toward the wooden ladder steps that climb up toward the open stars. I set a tiny, pale pebble between them to mark the very start of the line. It doesn't reach all the way up yet, but sitting on my little wooden track made the sky feel a little closer.