Eyes chase the dust motes playing in the sun framed in shadows cast by the window frame. I wonder that they might be alive, even if we think of dust as the slag of our skin, cast off in a neverending shedding season, our constant state of ephemera we purposefully cast a blind eye toward — afraid of our own mortality. Unable to accept we are a season of dust, we focus our gaze on the verdant, the thriving as we sweep the parts of our dying under the rug for someone else to discover after we have passed on.
Consider this: Could the “dead” cells of ourselves still be alive? By what measure have we to decide when they are finally and truly dead things? They never had a heartbeat and we cannot confirm they ever had mind — although I will argue that there is more mind than we are inclined to recognize in the world around us — much less this have an active mind.
And yet, be it the vagaries of air eddies and their imagined whims, or dust motes at play, one has to wonder if any of this must be as it seems. Who is to say that if we look beyond the scrim before our eyes and truly see, if we might not see more than what everything seems.
14 responses to “Half-penny thoughts — 07may25”
A valid idea. If you think of the amount of living creatures that’ve lived and died on the planet, their flesh an bones laid wherever to deteriorate, it makes sense that we the living are doing so amongst the dust of those who went before. 🙂
I still like the old “wisdom” that everyone at some point has likely drank water that has passed though a dinosaur at some point. My mother is appalled when I repeat things like that, but she should be used to my lack of decorum after this many years. 🤣
‘We are stardust
Billion year old carbon’, as the -Woodstock’ lyrics say. I agree with you. We’re all made out of everything and each other, and that includes the dinosaurs. It’s what binds us all together in Nature. Maybe your mother is more triceratops who’s wondering how her offspring has more velociraptor than she expected. 😂
🤣
Interesting thoughts. I’ll be studying the dust motes. But who knows where the line is drawn, if there is a line at all. “we are a season of dust” excellent line.
Thank you.
I like to challenge my “understanding”. I think too many people are too certain of their knowledge. It has gotten me into trouble over the years when I ask awkward questions.
It’s all about acknowledging what you don’t know. And keeping an open mind.
I like your thought process here, Michael. Who are we, as a race, to determine what existence actually is? Is what we term ‘death’ merely a different state of ‘life’. I’m fairly convinced that everything leaves a trace behind (albeit some more potent than others) so would it be so unbelievable to think that we have a living part of ourselves floating around us?
Much to think about.
I’m sure much of my thinking is influenced by my increasingly animist point of view. I think sooner if this confusion we have goes to that need we discussed earlier about needing to make sure everything has a box to put it into.
Useful to have, but what if the box cannot contain the thing it is meant to box?
And in each of us lies a watchful Pandora.
That seems like a frightening prospect. 🤣
🙂Keep you on your toes though!
I hope the little world in my vacuum cleaner is doing okay 😅 All jokes aside it really is a fascinating rabbit hole to jump down!
My brain is full of such rabbit holes 🐰