What breaks the enchantment?

[davem]

It is as if the remants of Eden fade further with each passing year.

But the memory & the yearning remain. So what does that tell us? Aren't those things as much 'Eden' as the physical trees & rivers that were 'once upon a time'? In fact, isn't that phrase. 'Once upon a time' (& 'over the hills & far away' - or as I prefer 'over the hills to faraway') part of the little bit of Eden that we all carry in our hearts?

The Elves haven't gone - not really - they still live, like the Hobbits, in that place. And its not all that far away, either - like the man said, 'Still round the corner there may wait, a new road or a secret gate, & though I oft have passed them by, a day will come at last when I, shall take the hidden paths that run, west of the moon, east of the sun.'

Have you never looked at a distant horizon & felt that 'pull', that 'sense' that its just over there, & that if you set off, right then, you'd get there?

Of course, you can't just set off, because you have responsibilities here, things you have to do. But one day you will, because, just like Bilbo, you want to see 'Mountains again, mountains!'

Anyway, if you feel the way you say you do, I don't think you're all that 'old' - not really....