TO THE LIGHTHOUSEordinary experience, to feel simply that’s a chair,that’s a table, and yet at the same time, It’s amiracle, it’s an ecstasy. The problem might besolved after all. Ah, but what had happened?Some wave of white went over the window pane.The air must have stirred some flounce in theroom. Her heart leapt at her and seized her andtortured her.

"Mrs. Ramsay! Mrs. Ramsay!" she cried,feeling the old horror come back—to want andwant and not to have. Could she inflict that still?And then, quietly, as if she refrained, that toobecame part of ordinary experience, was on a levelwith the chair, with the table. Mrs. Ramsay—itwas part of her perfect goodness to Lily—satthere quite simply, in the chair, flicked herneedles to and fro, knitted her reddish-brownstocking, cast her shadow on the step. Thereshe sat.

And as if she had something she must share,yet could hardly leave her easel, so full her mindwas of what she was thinking, of what she wasseeing, Lily went past Mr. Carmichael holdingher brush to the edge of the lawn. Wherewas that boat now? Mr. Ramsay? She wantedhim.310

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