Thursday, June 11, 2009

Everything's Relative

It's hard to believe that it's late spring or meteorological summer, with a long string of temperatures of 60 degrees F or less. It feels quite chilly even though it's June. However, I have to remind myself that most people around here (Illinois) would have given almost anything to get temperatures this warm a few months ago. Our bodies and brains adjust their expectations so that we notice significant deviations from the normal temperature, even as that normal temperature varies over the course of the year. Similarly, a day is longer for a young child than it is for an older person because it is a larger percentage of the life experienced up to that point. This is why time seems to accelerate and whiz by as you grow older. A day, week, month, or year becomes a smaller and smaller percentage of your life. The allure of travelling to exotic places decreases as the number of those trips increase. A tourist and a traveling salesperson have different impressions of the same trip.
All of this is to say that there are very few absolute goals in life. You might as well be satisfied with what you have, because the value of looking for more decreases as you keep seeking additions to what you already have. Enjoy the journey. It's more interesting than accumulating destinations just for the sake of saying you've been there.

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