I can remember hearing that we experience time in a linear fashion to keep everything from happening all at once. Today...well, today I realized everything happens at the same time anyway.
Yesterday I wore myself out in the 90-degree sun playing volleyball for four hours after work. By the time I got home I realized the water I'd been drinking at the beach was not enough. I was desperately dehydrated and dizzy. I scraped together the only thing I could find to eat, a couple fried eggs on a tortilla. Note to self: eggs are not for queasy stomachs. No matter how much water I drank last night I couldn't sleep. I awoke every couple of hours to drink more then stumbled back into bed. Surely, I told myself, tomorrow will be better.
No such luck. The alarm radio went off bright and early with the news that London had just suffered a terrorist attack. The weight on my chest nearly kept me in bed. I trudged into work and kept my head down most of the day, forgoing engineering work for data entry and from time to time taking part in a somber discussion of the news from England.
I left work early to prepare for my dinner plans tonight. I was getting together with 20 or so friends at one of my favorite Thai joints. As people started to arrive my thoughts turned from London to the party. I realize now that I even forgot to ask for a moment of silence.
Leave it to the Beatles to sum up my point: life goes on. Always. I feel the loss of those in London, but I remind myself that people on this planet die every second. And we get new souls at an ever faster rate. It's tragic. It's beautiful. But it doesn't stop. I've wrestled with it, I've prayed about it, but in the end no matter what I do life continues. So I'm forced into the conclusion that even as I acknowledge and mourn the loss of my fellow humans, I simultaneously rejoice and celebrate in all the beauty of life.
The bulls still ran today. The Tour de France continued. I still celebrated my birthday. And when I die, every one and everything will continue on, unabated.
I would have it no other way.
Posted by George at July 7, 2005 11:41 PMbravo. truly. and... yes, we would have it no other way.
Posted by: delara at July 8, 2005 03:51 AMdamn the dehydration. one of the banes of my existence, actually--hence i never leave home without my nalgene bottle. :) i also believe in keeping powdered gatorade in the house for just that kind of a situation... maybe you wanna invest in some, too, georgie?
oh well, glad you're feeling better. and happy happy birthday and san fermin. the world indeed goes on, and it's better for having you in it.
Posted by: nas at July 8, 2005 03:46 PMNicely said!
Happy birthday!!!
Heppy heppy birthday to you, George! Sorry this is belated, just got back from Joseph's birthday vacation at Disney over a long weekend past.
"If time were space, history would be a spider-web..."
~ Terence McKenna
-VG
Posted by: doctor vince at July 11, 2005 10:14 AM