The Most Terrifying Thought. (Part 1)
Recently, Kathy has asked or 85 year old mother, Fran, who has been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, a couple of questions about her past. Did she remember food rationing during the war years? Where did certain people live in Eugene, Oregon? Does she remember her nurse friends, etc. More and more, Fran answers these kinds of questions with “I don’t know”. In earlier stages of the disease, she would say this with some resignation or acceptance that her oldest memories are fading but with a confidence that this was the new normal. Lately, it seems that she says “I don’t know” with a tone of wonder, as if to ask “where did that memory go?”. When she was just starting to lose memory, I think she believed that it was limited and she could cover for the missing parts with humor and intellect.
Now, I think this false bravado is beginning to give way to anxiety about how much and how fundamental these memories are that are not coming back. She tries to push it out of her mind and just live day by day but this is becoming more difficult. That is why it is somewhat of a shock to her when she is brought back, face to face, with the reality of her memory loss. This has to be a pretty terrifying thought.
This is not the most terrifying thought though. I don’t know if Fran has the most terrifying thought. She has always seemed unconcerned about the big picture, purpose of life kind of thoughts. Maybe it is self preservation via denial. Maybe it is just wise.
Occasionally, I wonder, how important is all that I have struggled with emotionally and physically. That part of me that wants recognition, praise, adulation, approval, or at least confirmation that I am relevant in some broader way than my day to day existence, it tries to scale out to the people I know, and maybe the people I come in contact with remotely, and ultimately, to my part in the whole world, the entire universe. This is where I get scared.
I compare myself to the thousands of people who die every day of starvation or diseases that are unknown in 1st world lifestyles. I am no different, no more deserving, and in many ways, less deserving of the comfortable lifestyle I have. But this is not the most terrifying part either.
In the larger scale of things, we, the African farmer, the Hindu tea plantation worker, the Siberian goat herder, everybody else, and I are the same in our relative importance to the universe, that is to say, we are not important. We are not consequential. Whether we start a business and earn a million dollars or eat grass today, it doesn’t matter. We are nothing. At most, we can share a moment of joy with our family and neighbors. We struggle to go on another day, maybe, if we’re lucky, we can look forward to a happier day in the undefined future. But it is just a day. A finite, meaningless, passing of time.
Some day there will be no more people. Whether by self destruction or natural calamity. Sooner or later, our species, despite valiant efforts by so many scientists and futurists, will collapse upon itself, just as the dinosaur’s did and who knows how many species before them. And there is nothing I will do in my entire lifetime that will persevere this fate. I will cease to exist.
My commitment to science and reason is my undoing.
It has no happy ending.
I can contemplate this.
That is the most terrifying thought.
