Terminal Understanding

There is an odd tenderness that comes with aging. Perhaps it is that we understand our own fragility or that we can see the end of time from here and wish to be gentle as we move our gaze forward. I’m not sure. Like everything else now I no longer make assumptions about anything.

Our universe, the known knowledge has become so overwhelmingly large. My understanding of facts presented shift like loose marbles under my feet. “I’m not sure what to believe,” mutters one acquaintance, as he shakes his head, bombarded by new information masked in a chaotic jumble of electrons.

The air we breathe, the ground we walk on, the oceans we swim no longer portend certainty. I let the water trickle though my fingers and my understanding of its construct, its future and my relationship to it no longer in my grasp. I simply do not know anything for certain. Except that. I am uncertain.

My inner life has become clearer. My emotions more sorted out. My sense of peace intact. My dear body reflects its past and remarkably holds fast. It is just my understanding that has shifted. My sense of time and space and our place here on the delicate blue marble is what has wobbled.

I reach, like ET with his finger, trying to phone home. Trying to lock in my understanding of my home in the cosmic sense and whirling by the understanding the minute I think it is within reach.