I never particularly cared for science class in school, which is funny because now I’m taking a botany course for my horticulture certificate and I relax by kicking up my Keens to watch The Universe or some National Geographic documentary. (Although tonight it was The Rockford Files.) This occurs to me as I remember some snippet about the moon moving away from us. It orbits out an inch or so every year and at some point it will leave our gravitational pull. And that’s cool, everything’s changing all the time here on Earth too. But it feels strange. The moon has always been with us, as far as we know. It’s not just a cluster of meteors; we share some of the same core materials. We probably formed at the same time.
I’m thinking about the moon eventually spinning across the universe because I’m having one of those moments of clarity, a painful epiphany, and I’m trying to rationalize how I got here. I keep having this realization every month or two and I’m so unwilling to accept it I have to keep having it, again, and again. I’m sure it happens everywhere, to all sorts of people. But it’s nothing we envision for ourselves (or prepare for, as with some expected unpleasantries). I looked away for a minute, five at the most, and my friends weren’t my friends anymore. Not all of them and not my dearest, but some who had been there for me and I for them for so many years the bond was expected to go on forever. Wouldn’t you know it, a dozen or so years go by and we don’t know each other at all. And if we met now, we probably wouldn’t become friends.
This is of course a disappointment, but it’s not the worst thing in the world. And I really don’t think any of us should take it personally. I’m trying not to go there. What I need to do is get my speed up and whirl off to another galaxy.
