{"id":11132,"date":"2026-08-21T11:00:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-21T19:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rknibbe.com\/Wordpress\/?p=11132"},"modified":"2026-08-21T11:01:02","modified_gmt":"2026-08-21T19:01:02","slug":"wistful","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rknibbe.com\/Wordpress\/archives\/11132","title":{"rendered":"Wistful"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

To be alive in this world is to exist in a kind of absurd melodrama. John Steinbeck was right when he concluded that an individual does not even understand what is happening to him from moment to moment. We can’t seem to help ourselves, ascribing some purpose to it all. Yet all our teleologies fail us. The revelation came to him while writing a log of his experience aboard the Western Flyer, combing the coastline of the Sea of Cortez with Ed Ricketts and a thin supporting crew, cataloging epipelagic sea life. Focus on the is<\/em>, not the has<\/em> or the what<\/em> might be<\/em>. Breathe. Things just is. Mattering is an illusion. Illusions aren’t useless, they can be temporary salves. Meditate. Where you exist in the moment in relation to no one else but the self. The infinite loop of breath and unbidden thought. It will frighten you at first, when you come to understand you cannot will <\/em>the thoughts away. The activity of the brain is automatic, “your” purpose is not its purpose. Try it, you’ll see what I mean<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 21st century America, average life expectancy is near 78 years old, compared to one hundred years ago when it was about 60 years old. One hundred years ago about 400 children (in 100,000) would die before their 14th birthday. Worldwide, in the past 10,000 years, more than 100 Billion human beings have died. Way back when it was so bad that the average woman would have 6-8 live births expecting only 2 would survive. People die all the time and last week Friday it was my Mom’s turn. People will say she was 92, so at least she lived a good long life! Oh that we should all go as peacefully as she did! Strangely, none of that consoles me now. I love my mother. I miss my mother, greatly. My brain is thick with grief and there’s not a thing I can do to will it away<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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To be alive in this world is to exist in a kind of absurd melodrama. John Steinbeck was right when he concluded that an individual does not even understand what is happening to him from moment to moment. We can’t seem to help ourselves, ascribing some purpose to it all. Yet all our teleologies fail […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wikipediapreview_detectlinks":true,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"set","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11132","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rknibbe.com\/Wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rknibbe.com\/Wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rknibbe.com\/Wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rknibbe.com\/Wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rknibbe.com\/Wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11132"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.rknibbe.com\/Wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11132\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11139,"href":"https:\/\/www.rknibbe.com\/Wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11132\/revisions\/11139"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rknibbe.com\/Wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11132"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rknibbe.com\/Wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11132"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rknibbe.com\/Wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}