Writing about it almost seems foolish because there is no rational way to explain how something so clearly intangible was also so undeniably evident.

But while I was still hunched over, a flicker of recognition fired across my brain waves and I used my left hand to test a theory. Indeed, there was a matching chunk on the other side of the same piece of the table. Then the recognition washed over.

I’ve been thinking a lot about sunsets lately. Partly this is because it’s October in Illinois and the late afternoon sun these days illuminates the grass and trees in a way that just can’t be described in words.

Today is the first Sunday of Advent. After three more, it’ll be time for Christmas. On each Sunday we church folk light a new candle tied to a spiritual pillar that helps focus on the coming celebration of the birth of Jesus — hope, peace, joy and love. This is a gross simplification of course, but this isn’t a liturgical encyclopedia.

That the season tends to mean different things to different people goes without saying — not even counting the folks who don’t bother with the religious trappings of the holiday — but also it tends to mean different things to the same people depending on their particular circumstances when the December arrives.

In the first year of this website, I managed to produce six entire blog posts. The last one went live Dec. 13, 2016. Which is to say I’m not exactly on pace to match the initial productivity rate.

The last time I launched an online writing project, I committed to posting something every day. That proved to be an almost overwhelming task, but it absolutely transformed the way I saw the world and went about my day. Self imposed deadlines and focus caused me to seek inspiration nearly everywhere — and oftentimes forced inspiration inorganically, which certainly showed in the final product.

Seven and a half miles is, in the big picture, a very short distance. Back in my fitter days, I could cover that distance in about 35 minutes on a bike, and somewhere between 90 and 120 minutes on foot, depending on stamina.

But for our family, relocating our base of operations that distance was intended to completely alter the way we approach day-to-day life.

There’s no way to calculate how many baseball games I’ve played in or watched in my 37 years — and, to be fair, even when I was on the roster I watched more than I played — but suffice it to say I can see a 6-4-3 double play as it develops.

So when Yasiel Puig hit a ground ball Saturday evening, as soon the producer switched to a camera showing Addison Russell sizing up the play I found myself saying, “That’s it.” Sure enough, Russell fielded the ball cleanly, flipped to second where Javier Baez caught the toss and fired it to Anthony Rizzo at first base, immediately before Puig’s foot hit the bag. Just like that, the Chicago Cubs eliminated the Los Angeles Dodgers, won the National League Championship Series and will be playing in the World Series for the first time since 1945.

A few weeks ago, as Major League Baseball began its spring training season, the league’s social media accounts shared a picture of the Toronto Blue Jays playing a game at the Philadelphia Phillies’ longtime spring training home in Clearwater, Fla.

The image transported me instantly to March 1997 — the only year our family visited our family for spring break instead of the annual Christmas trip. That week my grandfather, who had season tickets to spring training games (the stadium was about 45 minutes south of his condo), took my younger brother and me to two games, including one against the Blue Jays.

In puzzling over the varied ideas for the site, I spent a lot of time mulling the word “favorite.” Yet I think perhaps I should have spent more time on the word “part.” Or at least the word “day.” Both are, in this context, more important.

Favorite is pretty easy to understand, though it’s often connected with a thing more so than a part — and not just because of the song. Your favorite song, favorite TV show, favorite movie and so on. But those favorites tend to evolve over time for a variety of reasons.

Rationally, we’re able to understand nothing we can see or touch is permanent. We’ve all loved pets or grandparents, or worked at jobs and lived in homes we knew weren’t intended to last forever. I know some day I won’t have to rise before dawn to pack a school lunch and usher a son out the door. (That day will come, right?)

Yet ever since the eighth grade, I’ve been somewhere between challenged and enthralled with living in the midst of a denouement. Back then (1993, if you’re keeping score at home) it was because two things were ending simultaneously — junior high and “Cheers,” the latter of which I enjoyed significantly more than the former. But if nothing else, eighth grade was a devil I knew intimately. I mean, I didn’t hate it or anything, but it was no “Cheers.”