Endurance, Pi and the Radiator
Yep, it's that day you look forward to all year. It's Pi Day, March 14th, Einstein's birthday. 3.14159265... which some brilliant fool has extrapolated out past 22 trillion digits. Pi never repeats, has no pattern (although there is always someone in the room suggesting no pattern is itself a pattern) and it goes on forever, kind of like some of my sentences.
A week ago images surfaced of a shipwreck on the bottom of the Weddell Sea in Antarctica. Ernest Shackleton's polar expedition vessel that was crushed in pack ice and sank in 1915 has been found and photographed under 10,000 feet of the frigid ocean. If, dear friend, you don't know this epic tale, order the book today and read it tomorrow, or next week, or the following, considering the state of the post office. Amazon Prime, right? Two days... What didn't governmental chaos plus a couple impeachments plus a plague plus an insurrection plus Brexit plus the Tonga explosion plus act one of World War Three not upend? Did I mention the lockdown plus not seeing peoples' faces for two years plus inflation plus that ship wedged in the canal plus wildfires plus Ragnarok...
What these have in common can be summed up by watching Alan Watts' "Chinese Farmer" story on Youtube. We are living Pi everyday. It is always different. It never repeats. It goes on infinitely. Our human condition includes tragedy and birth, accident and blessings every single time we get out of bed. You have no idea what tomorrow brings. No one does. There is only one thing that can be done. Do what Shackleton did. Get up and go again. Sail to the end of the earth in a ship that looks like it was built in the 1600s, get trapped in ice for a year, ship sinks, hike over pack ice, eat your sled dogs, split up, sail 800 miles in a wooden life boat in the worst weather on earth to an island, climb... Just read the book folks. My point is, yep, this is it. Go again. BUT, smile at the person you are passing on the stairs. Right now. We are all living those passing digits. Show some love every chance you possibly can as this is the only thing that makes us not just math, just animals circulating, just shouting callousness on a TV screen... Love is the answer and you know it. Ghandi said, "Be the change you want in the world."
"And the sun comes in like a god
Into my room
All perfect light and promises..."
sings that pop song from the 80s sounding like scripture and hope. And it's highly danceable. Today's Pi Day challenge: love each other until you can't keep your eyes open. And then go again, like Ernest. Make a difference, like Albert. Be like that Ghandi chap. 1% better every week adds up...
Solidarity with the blue and yellow.
love love,
b mac
P.S. And buy art. Art keeps you centered more than TV. And the outdoors. And maybe exercise. And sunshine. And the dog. Good food... but mostly ART.
P.P.S. BTW, Ghandi didn't say that exactly. Those eight words are a paraphrase but a nice distillation of a pithy paragraph. 3.14 works better sometimes...
P.P.S.S. Alan Watts is reminding us of silver linings. We have no idea where today's turmoil will lead. "Aren't you worried?!" demanded Tom Hanks in that spy movie. "Would it help?" was the repeated reply. For years I have reminded friends that "Worrying is using your life force to focus on the thing you don't want to happen." Disaster?! Maybe. Meanwhile, affirm hope. Radiate warmth.
