Chronicles

Our individual stories are massive. It would take volumes to retell them. The amount of luck and fortitude it took between the first vibration in the primordial ooze to the moment where I sit in front of this computer eating a cookie is staggering. It is daunting to consider the impossibility of each individual alive today. It makes me think that I ought to treat myself to nice cookies.

I bought a house 8 years ago. It was in a neighborhood that was going from bad to worse but it was my first house and it was what I could afford. The house had been owned by an older woman who died and was then abandoned for sometime. When I moved in, there was very little remaining, in the shed, behind the house, was the usual clap-trap of unwanted, discarded items. An old sewing machine with foot peddles, beat up chairs, broken lamps and several boxes containing some possessions of the deceased woman. Inside the boxes were rosaries, bibles written in German, old black and white photographs, a diary and letters spanning many years.

These items should have been handed down to the next generation but I suspect there was no one left. The woman that had lived here was the end of her line. She was the last chapter of that family chronicle. As with any well written book, it is sad to reach the end but each story is written with the knowledge that it must, at some time, cease.

We should all remember to treat ourselves to nicer cookies.