I have found in my few years on earth that there is really really nothing new under the sun. When you think you have discovered something or invented something new, usually you will find that other people have known about it all along.
This gives me a kind of comfort. That may sound weird or silly or something and I don't really know why it affects me that way, but it does.
One time when I was mowing the cemetery, I was reading the gravestones as I was passing them. Born in 1841...died in 1845...born in 1904...died in 1979...born in 1933...died in 1933...on and on and on...people had lived and died and were buried here in the cemetery, most of them had been gone longer than I had been alive. Some died young, some died old, and lots had died the same day or were maybe stillborn, but they all existed in this world, for their time.
The ones that lived long lives were probably a lot like everyone now. They grew up, most married and had families, I don't know their stories but they surely did have stories.
The ones that died young didn't really have a lot of time to make many stories, but they had lives and somebody loved them and missed them when they died.
It made me feel really small. Small in the bigger scheme of life. I felt like a pinpoint in the universe. All these people, lived and died here in this place, and so many many billions more all over the world.
Then, it made me feel big. I was living my life, same as every one of those people had lived theirs. Oh yes, I was doing different things, my things, but basically the same. Growing, having a family with all the same joys and heartaches that they had lived.
Then I thought of all my children, grandchildren, great grands, on and on, through time, as long as time will last, living their lives as they will, as I have lived mine.
Yes, it gave me comfort to know that time goes on, life goes on, with different people, here and in different places, in different ways. We are here for just a moment.
Ecclesiastes 3
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