Personification of the planet
Every so often when I leave the train station and walk home, I have a feeling that the planet has a particular personality and a voice. It only happens when it's late and I'm the only one walking up the hill; the sky is dark, and the street lights are on, and it's quiet. I think about how I walk up this hill almost every day, in this one neighborhood of Boston to go to work and then to go home. And I think about how small of a space I occupy on this planet.
At this very moment I usually start to think, "what are other humans doing?" I wonder how many people are asleep, how many people are on an airplane, how many people are in the pacific ocean (on ships, in submarines) , I wonder what celebrities are doing, I wonder what Barack Obama is doing, I wonder what the people in the houses with the lights on that I walk by are doing. Ultimately I wonder how people are spending their precious resource that is time.
It's usually at this point, that I look up at the sky and think about the planet as a person. And how he (and it is a he for some reason) just exists and is not bothered or affected by me. We have a new president, and although I feel so many emotions around it, anger, sadness, fear, he doesn't feel that at all. To him, I'm a blip in history. I'm just one person out of billions.
I end up wondering if my life is just a small part of history or given the state of the world, is it the tail end of history. Will anyone be around hundreds of years from now to read about 2017 in their history books (if books still exist).
I think about how I'm really thirsty sometimes, but it's ok because I can easily get drinkable water in so many different ways. Sometimes I feel guilty that I'm not hydrating myself enough (because I can!) I think about how it's only been recent that the bottle water plastic guilt is a thing. I think about how fragile it will be, when water becomes a problem. It already is in so many different places in this world.
My world is made up of:
- Home (shelter)
- Work/Office (make money)
- Money (buy food, and shelter, and miscellaneous things like clothes, and shoes, and vacations, and entertainment, and gym)
- Commute from home to work
- Train that takes me places
- Sidewalks
- Coffee
- Gym
- TV shows/movies
- Books
- Family, friends, boyfriend, coworkers, strangers
- Thoughts
- Feelings
- Seasons (Winter, Spring, Summer, Fall)
- City
- Neighborhood
- Government
- Taxes
- Health care
- Safety