Quantifying, grading, rank, worth, value
Quantifying, grading, rank, worth, value. How can one's worth be weighed? In the end it is meaningless. And here one soon realizes that death is arbitrary. Men, women, and boys are killed in spite of worth, in spite of rank, or goodness. It is a great and terrible spinning wheel with names on it. When it spins no one knows where it will land, or even that it is spinning. And when it lands on a name, someone is dead.
My father spent his life quantifying, grading, measuring, degrees and grade point averages and feet of elevation climbed per hour on Appalachian Mountain hiking trails. He didn't notice the flowers along the trail, only the numbers. In the end I guess he feels his numbers will stand for posterity, a measure of success, of life.
How can we measure the greatest of all things: the human heart, or spirit, beauty, or even the mind, for that matter?
Comments
Quite often, the need to quantify is a result of some detachment. Because numbers are concrete and have no apparent emotional attachment, it allows one to separate himself emotionally from that which is quantified. By attaching a number, especially to a person or event, the emotional attachment is gone. I sometimes have to do this myself to remain emotionally stable, especially in the face of overwhelming tragedy
Posted by: Smokey | January 29, 2007 10:34 PM
It was probably like this for your father with his father, etc. It doesn't make him a bad guy. Different strokes for different folks, thankfully. Thank you for all that you do Jeff.
Posted by: Sinopa Aylen | January 30, 2007 8:14 PM