Time

Yesterday in physics class, Mr. Maley handed out some old free response questions for us to work out. While the first thing that most of us read is the question or problem itself, I looked at the year the free response question was from. 1999 was the answer.

I know: it’s not necessarily the most mind-blowing thing you’ve heard. But I think about dates and the past quite frequently. When I see that 1999 on the paper, I ask myself “who was I in 1999?” and “who answered this test question in May of that year?” I find it incredible that millions of small variables and circumstances lined up so that thirteen years after the question was first printed; it lands on my hands in class.

If someone had told my four-year-old self that thirteen years from that point in time I would be answering a physics question in an American classroom, I’d probably dismiss that person as some crazy gypsy. But it turned out to be true. How did that happen?

I think the same way about planets and the universe. Sometimes, I feel that humans, as a society, are extremely egocentric. After all, we are just a few tiny people on a small planet whirling around a non-significant star in a random galaxy. Can’t we ever look past that? Will we ever be able to conceive the notion that we are tiny – that we live in an infinite universe? Will we ever find life other than us? Is there life beyond that of this planet?

Well, that’s all. More random thoughts. I apologize for the terrible writing: I find it very challenging to put these thoughts on paper. I’m starting to sound like Carl Sagan.

Conrado Brenna