What remarkable pieces of life we human beings are. We are blood and bone -- an earthy physiology of cells conglomerated into sinew and tissue, powered by positive and negative charges firing to move fluid and muscles in a remarkable "body" machine. The heart beats and hammers. Blood pulses and flows. Synapses spark and arc. We are merely one of so many creatures that inhabit this planet called "Earth." But we are also set apart and made different by a sparking core that knows our body to be mortal, even as our eternity yearns for our home in the stars.
This human spirit is a gloriously confounding thing to behold. In the cosmic scheme of things we are small; but at the same time, the essential nature of our inner being demands that we know ourselves as large. Our ability to love, to hate, to cherish, to yearn and to ache mark us a giants plowing the universe. We are power and perversity packed into fragile, unprotected bodies that create magnificently and destroy mightily.
The wonder of the human spirit roaring to life, reaching for purpose and striving for the glory of living fully realized, is utter magnificence. Our passion for life -- for meaning and self-knowing -- charges through every cell of our makeup, urging us to stand tall as we stride this journey. And yet, our hearts are so gently needing and so very delicate at the same time. What a remarkable and divinely beautiful confluence of living we embody.
The soul, the breath, the heart of man reaches out to conquer, to control, to embrace and to be embraced. We strive to be unique as at the same time we hunger to be encased in the comfort of others -- to know that we are not alone. It is this beautiful hunger that separates us and makes man stunning in our ability to create and mark the land -- to leave evidence that we have lived.
And, to have lived well is a mighty undertaking, a journey of mind and heart. It can be loud and sonorous, quiet and intense or breezy and bright. Each of us has a heart song to fling to the universe in our quest to be realized, to be counted, to make a difference. What that difference will be is the eternal question of bards and poets, criminals and saints, children and elders.
Yet when all is done, when our spirit departs, what is left is simply bone and tissue -- a quiet husk so similar to other creatures that live and breathe and die. So the days of our living should be registered one to another. The acknowledgement that a soul, just like mine, walks in the person beside me is the grit of this living thing. There I am, as are you.
And we are magnificent!