Seems like in the world there's only one story right now that everybody is talking about.
And even as I realize that I'm obsessing over this one story, and there's of course other
things happening, and yet it feels so reasonable to be entirely focused on this one story.
There is nothing else that is as new and different and surprising and unusual and unexpected
and uncertain.
So of course, this will continue to be the obsession of all of us, it seems, for quite
a while.
But it is useful, I find, to remember that the universe does go on.
The universe continues.
And in the entire world of nature, we can look outside at the trees and, you know, spring
coming back, with buds on the trees, and there are animals who aren't particularly concerned
with any particular virus, they're just trying to get through their own lives, and nature
continues, regardless of what's going on in the human world.
But even more implacable, undisturbable, beyond anything in nature, any of our fellow creatures
here on the earth, it's the heavenly bodies and the sky and space: absolutely indifferent
to anything that's going on in the earth, on the surface of the earth.
We are just like little dots on the surface of a little ball way out on the fringes somewhere.
And, you know, it seems like the sun is about as concerned with what's going on on the earth,
as, you know, we are concerned with the bacterial populations growing on a discarded pistachio
shell in the corner somewhere.
It's completely irrelevant.
So the way the earth is spinning around the sun continues to remain absolutely regular.
And I find always there's something very pleasant about the regularity and the absolute assurance
that comes from observing the heavenly bodies, the sun, moon, planets and stars.
They are so absolutely regular, so predicted to fine detail for centuries ahead.
Unlike the weather, where of course, we don't even know often even the day of what's going
to happen, the way the air is moving around, so many unpredictable factors that could determine
whether we're going to get a sunny day or a storm.
But when it comes to rotating and revolving planets, it is so smooth.
So we can always be assured, no matter what, that the sun is going to behave the way it
behave, and it will never change in any conceivable way.
Of course, we have no idea what's going to happen with the world, and the world is always
capable of surprising us in so many ways.
But out of all the ways the world could surprise us, it seems like one of the least likely
is for the way the earth is spinning around the Sun to suddenly change.
There's a lot of other unbelievably unpredictable things that could happen much more plausibly
than that.
It's like this is something that we can really bank on, we can really trust, as having this
incredible regularity.
So right now we see the spring coming back.
It is the spring equinox has just passed.
We are now in the bright side of the year here in the northern hemisphere - and of course
opposite down south, going into the dark side - and this is absolutely predictable.
We don't know when spring is gonna come.
Right now here in Toronto the weather is falling below freezing, and looks like we're gonna
have a little more winter for a few more days.
But when it comes to the sun, we absolutely know that the sun's coming back.
So it may be warm, it may be cold, but we know that it is going to be bright.
This is something that, as far as I can see, will never change.
So I enjoy observing the passage of these different parts of the year and marking them
as they go by.
This is like the equivalent of the sunrise of the year.
If midwinter is midnight, midsummer is midday, and this spring equinox, this is the sunrise
of the year.
And so welcome to this day, welcome to the summer of 2020.
Even though it may not feel like it in the air, it's already coming in the sky.