BarefootBlog

Will the noblest human endeavors all be annihilated under the imploding universe someday, never to be remembered and never to have been regarded by the dispassionate impersonal immensity?

Am I anything other than a remarkably developed living thing? Are my experiences, conclusions, morals, feelings, etc., anything more than the electro-chemical interaction of my brain (a thing) with other things?

What then of paint and canvas becoming pain or fear? What then of touching the small of her back and kissing her neck so she forgets to breathe? What then of an afternoon in the park with young wife and child? What then of mathematical elegance or philosophical clarity?

Are all these things beautiful or true or meaningful if they and I have no eternity? -- if they and I are just matter in motion?

Such formidable considerations, such empty possibilities. How can I refute them? How can I even ignore them? How can I keep caring?

And yet, when she turns her head and her eyes flash, or when I think I can taste the scent of Monet's haystacks in the purple evening, or when the old woman cries over the lifeless body of her soldier son, it is easy to care. Even though it might all be transitory, beauty and truth and pain fill the experience, unaccompanied by futility.

But I always wonder again if it matters.