Today I've completed another ellipse around the Sun, 27 now by all classical measures. Its kind of crazy thinking that statistically speaking I'm well through 30% of my projected lifespan.
I'd hardly say that contributes to 30% of the experiences I'll have in my life time though - at least I hope not. There's a fantastic Youtube video by Kurzgesagt title "What Are You Doing With Your Life? The Tail End" that I like to rewatch on my birthday. It can be a bit of an existential look at ones self, but I also find it motivating.
Summed up, I have an expected 4264 weeks in my life. I've currently lived 1400 of them.
The first 600 weeks were spent as a child
The next 400 being a teenager
So far, I've spent about 400 of them as an adult, but really only 130 of those weeks I've been out of school and able to direct my path.
So, what have I done?
Well. Aside from the 2000 weeks I can expect to spend working my 9-5 day job I've been trying to use my time to explore. I grew up in a household where I was blessed with the experience of the outdoors. From about age 6 (312 weeks for the curious) I was involved in an outdoor stewardship group, think of your local boy scouts or girl guides. Here I learned about the fierce and unforgiving side of nature, as well as the beauty and magic in it. The absolute wonder that is life and all the many cycles within it. We would go on survival trips, tree planting missions, highway cleanups, and workshops all aimed at giving back to nature while also learning how to enjoy and survive within it. I stayed with this group through the end of my teenage years.
The Code we operated by "We have been given the earth for our life. It is a great entail. It belongs as much to those who come after us as to us, and we have no right by anything we do, or neglect to do, to involve them in unnecessary penalties or to deprive them of benefits which are theirs by right." was repeated often and with pride.
This experience sparked what has become a long lasting admiration and fascination with nature and the outdoors.
Inspired by my upbringing as well as the wealth of opportunity I have been provided I've been trying to spend as many of my remaining weeks exploring and appreciating nature.
I won't even begin to touch on all the intricate beauty I've experienced, but I do want to share one more quote.
Along with this quote I hope that these images, as well as the many more I have and hope to create will at the least show some of the magic in our world.
"We are going to die, and that makes us the lucky ones. Most people are never going to die because they are never going to be born. The potential people who could have been here in my place but who will in fact never see the light of day outnumber the sand grains of Arabia. Certainly those unborn ghosts include greater poets than Keats, scientists greater than Newton. We know this because the set of possible people allowed by our DNA so massively exceeds the set of actual people. In the teeth of these stupefying odds it is you and I, in our ordinariness, that are here.We privileged few, who won the lottery of birth against all odds, how dare we whine at our inevitable return to that prior state from which the vast majority have never stirred?" - Richard Dawkins
So, as I start my 28th year and 28th trip I hope I've instilled a smidge more curiosity and appreciation for the world around us. Onward to more greatness! Ad Astra.
Oh boy look how young I am... Sheesh. Only 26yrs old here. So much to learn.
