Thursday, September 22, 2005

Weird and wonderful

Every year, for the past few years, I've found myself thinking, "Oh my god, this is the weirdest year of my entire life!"

I kept waiting for those sorts of epiphanies to pass, thinking that I would eventually reach a year that actually wasn't terribly weird. And then other day something occurred to me.

It occurred to me that there was nothing weird about having the weirdest year of my life. Becuase that's what life was all about.

Every new experience leads us to a knew realization about something. And as much as I once thought that new experiences would eventually run out, I'm becoming increasingly convinced that, in fact, they won't. There are new things around every corner, waiting for us to discover them, waiting for us to rejoice in them. And in a way, every year will always be weirder than the last, simply because with each passing year we expect the next to make more sense based on the wisdom we've accumulated the previous year, and in each year before that.

But it never does. It never will.

And as I realized that, I realized also that I couldn't think of anything more wonderful. The notion of life always remaining fresh and new and interesting, instead of becoming sad and bleak and familiar, was one of the most refreshingly optimistic ideas I could concieve of.

At 32 years old, I still don't know what it's all about. I still don't know what tomorrow will bring, or next week, or next month, or, God help me, next year.

And I can't think of anything more wonderful than that.

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