Sauron
07-16-2006, 06:20 AM
I hope this isn't trite, but I saw Leesifer's thread about Bill and I'm kinda de-railed tonight.
I've spent a lot of time thinking about death and mortality lately. Since I lost my dad in March, and my closest friend committed suicide 31 days later, I've been pre-occupied with this topic. Having turned 44 last month, I also wondered where the time has gone, and how many days I have left. My mother's side of the family is short lived; my father's side is rather long-lived. I play this game with myself: "suppose you only have 20 years to live; how long is that?" And then I think backwards 20 years in time, to remember "what I was doing then? How long ago was that, and how much fun or accomplishment did you do in those 20 years?"
I also wonder if I have squandered my life; how many times have I sat around whining "there's nothing to do; I'm bored"? How many times have I sat on my ass -- or at the computer -- when I could have been outside hiking, in a museum, or just doing something else?
I think about how bad I felt when my father first had a stroke; how I cried so much that my stomach throbbed. I curled up on the couch in the fetal position and just wailed. I wonder if everyone goes through that. And then I think about the millions of people that have lived over the centuries; did they all experience ithe loss of a parent that way? That's an enormous amount of grieving over the course of history. And the love that I felt for my best friend; and how his parents felt for him, and their special, unique grief at his suicide. Where does that kind of grief ever find consolation? And how many millions of parents have felt it?
The problem with this kind of deep well is that if you look into it, it has an infinitely deep bottom. It can draw you in, like a moth to the candle. "Remember that when you look into the abyss, the abyss also looks into you."
I was out walking today and almost stepped on a bumblebee that was on the sidewalk. Instead, I watched it meander along and go in circles, fixated on this little creature. I wondered if it had any conception that its life could have been in mortal danger, if I hadn't been looking down at that moment. I also wondered -- for lack of a better way to say it -- why it even bothered to live at all, since the lifespan is measured in only 40 to 60 days, and then it was all over. Which led me to wonder if the bumblebee perceived the passage of time the same way that humans do; perhaps 60 days of life was an incredibly long time, if one is a bumblee, perceiving the world as a bumblebee does. Perhaps the bumblebee guards its appointed 60 days as jealously as we guard our threescore and ten years.
Life is so short. Be gentle to each other, because the damage that we do to each other is so much worse than the routine wear & tear that life throws at us.
I've spent a lot of time thinking about death and mortality lately. Since I lost my dad in March, and my closest friend committed suicide 31 days later, I've been pre-occupied with this topic. Having turned 44 last month, I also wondered where the time has gone, and how many days I have left. My mother's side of the family is short lived; my father's side is rather long-lived. I play this game with myself: "suppose you only have 20 years to live; how long is that?" And then I think backwards 20 years in time, to remember "what I was doing then? How long ago was that, and how much fun or accomplishment did you do in those 20 years?"
I also wonder if I have squandered my life; how many times have I sat around whining "there's nothing to do; I'm bored"? How many times have I sat on my ass -- or at the computer -- when I could have been outside hiking, in a museum, or just doing something else?
I think about how bad I felt when my father first had a stroke; how I cried so much that my stomach throbbed. I curled up on the couch in the fetal position and just wailed. I wonder if everyone goes through that. And then I think about the millions of people that have lived over the centuries; did they all experience ithe loss of a parent that way? That's an enormous amount of grieving over the course of history. And the love that I felt for my best friend; and how his parents felt for him, and their special, unique grief at his suicide. Where does that kind of grief ever find consolation? And how many millions of parents have felt it?
The problem with this kind of deep well is that if you look into it, it has an infinitely deep bottom. It can draw you in, like a moth to the candle. "Remember that when you look into the abyss, the abyss also looks into you."
I was out walking today and almost stepped on a bumblebee that was on the sidewalk. Instead, I watched it meander along and go in circles, fixated on this little creature. I wondered if it had any conception that its life could have been in mortal danger, if I hadn't been looking down at that moment. I also wondered -- for lack of a better way to say it -- why it even bothered to live at all, since the lifespan is measured in only 40 to 60 days, and then it was all over. Which led me to wonder if the bumblebee perceived the passage of time the same way that humans do; perhaps 60 days of life was an incredibly long time, if one is a bumblee, perceiving the world as a bumblebee does. Perhaps the bumblebee guards its appointed 60 days as jealously as we guard our threescore and ten years.
Life is so short. Be gentle to each other, because the damage that we do to each other is so much worse than the routine wear & tear that life throws at us.