Surprises

Used to be, knots and their tying were and integral part of daily life. Cities like Manila traded on the quality and value of their cordage, and even ordinary people had a familiarity and facility with knots that has long since become obsolete. This is what I thought about, as the doctor stitched up my hand with practiced, almost bored efficiency, and I gave thanks for the strange skills that persist long after we've abandoned them.

My ancestors, side by side with yours, spent centuries honing long dead skills, constructing notion by notion and stone by stone the safe, comfortable, modern world that gives me the luxury of my own selfishness. My petulant, childish moods and my arrogant navel-gazing uniqueitude. It's thanks to them that the World that doesn't owe me anything consists not of the ravages of the elements, beasts of the earth, or the horrors of plague. My World is instead the artifacts and machinations of you, Everybody Else. And you are just as implacable and inevitable as storms and leopards, and I'd do well to remember that. Started thinking the World owed me something...had to remember how to get around that.

The sky was beautiful today, and if I haven't said it lately, I do love you all.