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Reflections January 2014

Life Is for Living

The Journal of a Time Traveler

By Neil Wyrick

You may think January is too cold to be anyone's favorite but consider skiing and ice skating and the winter wonderlands that are created. Consider how this month brings out resolutions. Consider its relationship to a new year.

I am the sun. I have 12 children you have named and registered on a calendar. We are not suppose to have a favorite child. But I confess I do –  is January. Why January? Because it is a beginning and there is such freshness in beginnings.

You may think January is too cold to be anyone's favorite but consider skiing and ice skating and the winter wonderlands that are created. Consider how this month brings out resolutions. Consider its relationship to a new year.

Too cold? Consider what the temperature would be without my molten juices lightening up the sky. At any rate I got to thinking about all the events I've been shining down on all these centuries and thought I'd I share some that have made the greatest impact on me.

From dinosaurs to the digital. Consider the dinosaurs, named for their unusual shape and size, or where their bones were found. Or their large impact on the surrounding territory and caveman population. As you might well have imagined, they roared and frightened the human inhabitants on a daily basis. Of course, they never expected what happened. They became extinct.

The same thing that happened to the Roman Empire. While men were inventing new ways to build and destroy, others with equal arrogance and a lust for power were doing the same. Yes, I have seen winners and losers trade places on a regular basis.

The mood of the warrior is destructive and then there is the builder who creates. Do they balance each there? Yes, but there is not much learning in the process. Majestic engineering feats, new ways to war and destroy. Politics that feed and fed on selfishness too often and not enough on wisdom and altruism.

Events roll through the journals of time. It was monumental (4300-3100 BC) when during this period small groups began to grow into cities. Dogs, goats, pigs, oxen and sheep were domesticated. Aristocrats in Egypt used chairs as symbols' of power. The populations grew. There arose kings and queens to rule these groups. It was a long time before democracy rose to the fore. History seemed frozen in repetition. Not until the Industrial Revolution did progress move forward at warp speed.

Certain names  arise: Julius Caesar, Christ, Caiaphas and Judas Iscariot. Columbus, Alexander the Great. Leonardo Da Vinci, Benjamin Franklin, George Washington – and on through our current president, Barack Obama. Napoleon Bonaparte, conqueror of much of Europe. Florence Nightingale, establishing nursing as a respectable profession for women. Mahatma (great soul) Gandhi, leader of the Indian Nationalist movement against British rule and widely considered the father of his country.

And, yes, the millions who have never nourished or courted fame but nevertheless have kept civilizations alive.

The journal of which I have spoken actually is millions or even billion of pages long. I challenge you to fill in some blanks, think back on history personal and beyond and consider how it has affected you and how you have affected it.

 

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