For the Fallen

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,

Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.

...

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old;

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn

- Laurence Binyon in "For the Fallen." (1914)

What lives they could have led?

I came across "For the Fallen" on the Arsenal Twitter page a while back during one of the Remembrance Day weekends of football matches. I was struck by the line - "They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old".

It left in me a feeling of deep awe for those that gave their lives for a cause they deemed to be deserving enough (or for some, left with no choice), and in deep thought about what lives they could have led if they were not caught up in the throes of war, and what lives I and others could have missed if we had got caught up in the same - but who am I to say "could have"? Who knows the future? However, I do pray to avoid such a situation.

Writing now also brings to remembrance a dear friend I lost about 8 years ago (as of 2022), and how I often wondered what could have been for them, if that fork in the road had never happened.

If one could go back to moments before the mortal events that led to those forks, one would find memories being relived, lives being led, and dreams of a future being pondered.

Schrödinger's Cat

And then I wonder, aren't we all like Schrödinger's cat? At least, our future selves. Technically, the ticking hands of time are constantly opening up the chambers of future frames - infinite moments of such, and revealing to us (and other observers) the true state of our future selves - ON or OFF. The unpredictable and out-of-our-control events of life can be seen as representing the Geiger counter which may or may not trigger some mortal poison.

Life's a gift!

But hey! Chin-up! I'm not here to talk about the negative. I just needed to explore the topic and give credit to the author of that thought-provoking poem.

I think it's important to consider not just how life and the absence of it are not so far apart. But more importantly, to consider how this should make you consider how you live life.

Life is a gift! And not everybody is given the same measure. So while you've got it, maximize it!

Father time...

Father time (as NBA fans love to call it) is a taker of life. With each tick of the clock, their's more samples of Schrödinger's cat, and hence a higher cumulative probably that the poison gets discharged - if you had a dice with a 1/1000 probably of tails, if you rolled long enough, you'd eventually roll a tail. It's the Law of Large numbers.

There's that, and there's also the fact that father time counts up to eventuality - removing one second, one hour, one day, one year from "the rest of one's life".

...

Life's a gift!

Be grateful for it!

Make the most of it!