I just got back from Vegas for this big convention and if you have ever been to the top of Mandalay Bay, overlooking the Las Vegas strip, it really puts alot of things into perspective.
Furthermore, I came home to our pets who have missed us the past few days and imagined what it will be one day when I am a father and I dont have the luxury of taking off for a few or a month whenever I feel like it.
I walked up to my fish tank and they all swam to the edge of the glass like they always do to greet me and be fed. I started to think of their dependence on me for a food source. Since they are enclosed in this 60+ gallon tank, and there are no natural food sources in their ecosystem, they depend on me to change filters, water change and feed them. I started to think a little deeper about how I actually feel guilty having certain creatures for pets. Turtle and Fish etc. I know not many people do, but the adventurous spirit in me loves all creatures and in that light, sometimes wishes these creatures had the same free will that I am blessed with.
It got me thinking, as I often do, about my faith in god, but also my understanding of the world and my boyish curiosity of the things like aliens, dinosaurs, outer space and more.
I thought about the fish inside the tank and the fact that because of the circumstance they are born into (being born in a tank, living out their life in a tank) they have absolutely no idea of places like rivers and streams, and of other species. They live their life day to day, im sure content, (if fish can be content?) just swimming around in the only world they know. They are looking out at us, im sure wondering “what we are? – what else could be out there?” If fish even do that. Who knows? They could be dumb as rocks, but they seem intelligent enough to me to have some concept of thought.
It made me think about outer space and how essentially… we live on the planet earth. The planet earth is ONE PLANET in a massive galaxy that we have no idea where it starts or even ends. We are truly living our lives in a big fishbowl. That led me to think about one of my favorite songs by Pink Floyd where he sings “were just two lost souls living in a fishbowl, year after year”.
I think were all at the beginning; lost souls swimming around in our fishbowl looking out, some of us actually wondering what else is out there, wishing on stars, having faith in the unknown and seeking desperately to find out who we truly are before our time runs out, and in the end… we never really know how, or when and sometimes why its our time. Life is just this flowing ebb & tide bringing new things in and taking elements of life back out to sea (metaphorically speaking). Sometimes the things in life that get taken from you, happen for a reason. They wake you up, to establish your gratitude for what you have, to humble you and prep you for when your ready mentally, emotionally, physically and spiritually to have certain things. Sometimes those things come back when your ready and sometimes they leave you lingering, waiting and wondering and hoping for them to come back, but they never do.
I guess im rambling but I think the main point im trying to make here is to never forget that there is a big world out there. Dont be afraid to look past the glass and jump of your fish bowl every now and then. I think you might be surprised at the things you discover out there and more important, the things you discover within yourself.
- Danny
