About 2 weeks ago I spent a Sunday afternoon with a relative, old enough to be a grand parent. He told us stories from his high school days, stories about Uganda, stories about what was, particularly regarding the political landscape of back in the day.
As I listened it dawned on me that part of what I found fascinating about these stories was that there was a time NRM didn’t exist, not the way we know it now anyway. That there was a time other political parties had a stronghold in the country, a time other men held power and a time when this power changed hands frequently for one reason or other.Also fascinating to me was watching a man who had lived through all these times and listen to his perspective on things as they were, as they are and as they might be.
And the smallness of my existence dawned on me..
In the grand scheme of things, what do i mean and who am i? I will have no impact whatsoever on the history of my country, I will be but another one of the 40 million people who existed at this point in time (side note: he actually lived through a time when the population of Uganda was a paltry 6 million people,6 million!) And my story will pass unlauded, save for the people close to me, my story will be lost in the sea of millions. History, time, is bigger than all of us.
Source : Wait but why (the gray arrow is the big bang)
A character from one of my favorite shows Dark said something like ‘people think they still have time but you don’t have time, time has you’. And yes, the show itself is as mind boggling as that line. When all else in my mind settles, these thoughts keep stirring. And like a moth to a flame, similar thoughts find their way into my everyday reads. This is an excerpt from a beautifully written article that ponders our smallness. Enjoy.
“When one is considering the universe, unseen matter, our small backyard of the stuff, I think it is important, sensible even, to try and find some balance between laughter and uncontrollable weeping
Cry because we cannot even begin to understand how beautiful it is, cry because we are terribly flawed as a species, cry because it all seems so shockingly improbable that maybe our existence could be nothing but a dreamscape — celestial elephants in rooms without walls. But then? Surely, we can laugh.
Laugh because being riddled head-to-toe with human emotions while trying to come to terms with just how indisputably tiny we are in the grand scheme of things, makes absolutely everything and everyone seem quite ridiculous, entirely farcical. We have heads? Ridiculous! There are arguments about who is in charge here? Ridiculous! The universe is expanding? Ridiculous! We feel it necessary to keep secrets? Ridiculous.”
'two roads diverged...' 