The last few weeks I've had several things remind me of my 'smallness'.
I am learning about Voyager and the Golden Record it carries. It was launched 35 years ago, and had this amazingly romantic idea. It would carry this small record meant to encapsulate our planet. On it, there are sounds of so many things including baby's cry, greetings in numerous languages, animal sounds and the brain waves of Ann Druyan who was in love and would later marry Carl Sagan. The Voyager has been traveling at about 36K mph since it left in 1977. There are countless stars out there; thousands of stars you can't see for all those that you can and the Voyager won't reach the closest one for another 40,000 years. The idea that someone or thing might find this and might be able to listen to this and might be able to interpret this is so enchanting.
Jimmy Carter said so articulately, "This is a present from a small, distant world, a token of our sounds, our science, our images, our music, our thoughts and our feelings. We are attempting to survive our time so we may live into yours.'
A couple weeks back Curiosity landed successfully on Mars a mere 60 million away. Against the odds, the 7 minute landing controlled and monitored far, far, far, far away was a success and inspired and united a whole world by pushing the bounds of what humans have been given the capacity to do.
The other night I watched a stupid Nick Cage movie that gave some crazy stats about the size of our world and it's expanse of time. There are 1,000,000,000,000 stars in our galaxy and 1,000,000,000,000 galaxies out there, give or take a zero:P The mathematician in me wonders can our planet be 1 in a 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000...(you get the idea), how romantic an idea is that? In a blink of an eye in universe time there were dinosaurs and in another blink our sun will be burnt out.
And the other night, the biggest thing or rather the thing the put this size in perspective was mom's letter. I'm a believer in determinism, things happen for a reason. This amazing experience with this amazing Moula that I'm a beneficiary of, that my kids are a beneficiary of is unbelievable, it is beyond any math or logic. If I ever think things are random or without purpose, I will feel sorry for myself.
Also, I saw 'The Dark Knight Rises" today for the first of probably many times to come and it was out of this world AWE-some!
I am learning about Voyager and the Golden Record it carries. It was launched 35 years ago, and had this amazingly romantic idea. It would carry this small record meant to encapsulate our planet. On it, there are sounds of so many things including baby's cry, greetings in numerous languages, animal sounds and the brain waves of Ann Druyan who was in love and would later marry Carl Sagan. The Voyager has been traveling at about 36K mph since it left in 1977. There are countless stars out there; thousands of stars you can't see for all those that you can and the Voyager won't reach the closest one for another 40,000 years. The idea that someone or thing might find this and might be able to listen to this and might be able to interpret this is so enchanting.
Jimmy Carter said so articulately, "This is a present from a small, distant world, a token of our sounds, our science, our images, our music, our thoughts and our feelings. We are attempting to survive our time so we may live into yours.'
A couple weeks back Curiosity landed successfully on Mars a mere 60 million away. Against the odds, the 7 minute landing controlled and monitored far, far, far, far away was a success and inspired and united a whole world by pushing the bounds of what humans have been given the capacity to do.
The other night I watched a stupid Nick Cage movie that gave some crazy stats about the size of our world and it's expanse of time. There are 1,000,000,000,000 stars in our galaxy and 1,000,000,000,000 galaxies out there, give or take a zero:P The mathematician in me wonders can our planet be 1 in a 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000...(you get the idea), how romantic an idea is that? In a blink of an eye in universe time there were dinosaurs and in another blink our sun will be burnt out.
And the other night, the biggest thing or rather the thing the put this size in perspective was mom's letter. I'm a believer in determinism, things happen for a reason. This amazing experience with this amazing Moula that I'm a beneficiary of, that my kids are a beneficiary of is unbelievable, it is beyond any math or logic. If I ever think things are random or without purpose, I will feel sorry for myself.
Also, I saw 'The Dark Knight Rises" today for the first of probably many times to come and it was out of this world AWE-some!
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