Time

When I finally begin to get a glimpse of understanding the age of the universe, or how long the earth has been gyrating through our solar system, or how long it takes animals and plants to evolve, a wave of fear plunges, for a split second, down my chest and into my stomach--and is gone.

I look around outside and watch the leaves flutter on the tips of swaying branches, the brittle flowers opening up to the puffing and dissolving clouds above, bugs bobbing left and right, up and down in the moist, rain-washed forest, the white-washed moon charting it's way across the sky--stopping every time you peek upwards to spy on its movement. Why are these things so beautiful?

Maybe because they are new to me. Every time I witness something beautiful, tiny bird eggs at the bottom of a saliva-cemented twig wreath, or a spider successfully trapping a beetle in its carefully crafted web, it's like witnessing a miracle, seeing some rare sight only the patient and 'in-tune' can appreciate. But to the rocks and the earth, and the spaces in-between the life, if they had a say, would find ultimate boredom in the colorful autumn-blown leaves, snowy nights, and crimson horizons at dusk. How many times have those very things happened before? In how many different ways did they occur? I was sick of mowing the lawn after one summer.

Millions of times and millions of ways. That's the answer and the only thing I can do with it is try and understand it. I don't know how, or where to start, but that's the task.