Perpetual Astonishment

Something is in the air.

Ominous.

The dogs are running away.

Signs of the times abound.

It's just another opportunity to tune in to my own wavelength and get in touch with the intricacies of sentient experience.

This moment, then the next. Before I know it, a billion moments have passed between blinks of astonishment. I am alive. I am thinking. I am feeling. Each aspect of experience is enhanced by the contemplation of it. Real time thoughts effect real time goosebumps. Am I my thoughts? Am I my feelings? Am I the trillions of cells that comprise my body?

 I blink my third eye and open my first two. I draw my hands up to my face and attempt to memorize the profile of my fingerprints. I try to qualify the contorted contours of friction ridges. But they simply are, they are neither right or wrong. I really have nothing in the world to compare them to. There is no authority to which I answer for my finger prints. I may either accept them, or reject them. Others may accept them, or reject them. There is no device whereby to measure their objective quality. Perhaps a week ago, they would not have had these microscopic cuts from ivy vines, but perhaps they wont be there in another week. I will heal. They are what they are: here and now. They are as intrinsic to me as the braids in my eyes.

My gaze drifts down to my palm. Can palms be read? Are these furrows and lines a novel, or a novelty? Are these two volumes a history, or a prophecy? Do the cuts, and burns, and abrasions of my past foretell my future? Am I destined for great things, simply for the way my bones fold my flesh?

I took my life for granted for so long, it has kind of become a habit. But slowly, I am becoming mindful of my mortality. Dates jump off the page at me. Ptolemy's works, Shakespeare's. WWI was nearly a hundred years ago. The last survivor of the Titanic is dead, Jesus walked the earth 27 average lifetimes ago. Man set foot on the moon just .58 average lifetimes ago. I live in perpetual astonishment at the advancement of technology, and the simplicity of the human experience.

I rock my hands and face them downward. So many scars. THIS is a history. This is my unfinished narrative. These are the tokens of my existence. Some are badges of honor. Many are reminders of the follies of youth: impatience, stubbornness, negligence and imprudence. Perhaps I dwell on the past because of these little reminders. How many less would I have if I had simply worn gloves during my stint as a mechanic? I recall the discomfort of wearing gloves. They were veritable blindfolds to the friction ridges on my fingertips, impairing sensory feedback. Straight jackets. They always came off within minutes. I would rather get burned on a hot engine than be frustrated, unable to feel the edges of a nut, bolt, or threaded post. "Feel the burn", say physical trainers. It puts you in the 'here' and 'now' of your routine. It's not masochistic, it is real life. Hot and cold.