We saw this amazing little work of art while strolling through the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston a few weeks ago. It evoked cozy scenes like the ones seen in this similar display, and offers an opportunity to contemplate perspective. When I was taking an Astronomy course at Brandeis, I marveled at the ratty clothes our professor wore. Even by the sub-standards of professorial garb, this guy just didn’t give a fuck. The same went for his hair and beard, neither of which he bothered much with (certainly nothing in the way of product or even a comb by all indications). As the course went on, and his wardrobe revealed itself to be a revolving set of three or four shirts and two or three pairs of pants, it dawned on me that his area of expertise was such that in a philosophical stance the notion of clothes was indeed quite ridiculous.
This was a man accustomed to viewing our world not in the day-to-day minutiae, but in the grand, epic, millions-of-light-years perspective. Our lives were but a teensy-tiny fraction of the universe, less meaningful than a single grain of sand in all the beaches of all the planets. He would occasionally do his best to get across how vast the universe was, how immense our own solar system was, and how our little solar system was likely one of infinite systems. It brought a humbling perspective that I carry in my head to this very day.
Whenever I worry too much about silly things or get upset over minor annoyances, I think of that professor, and that astronomy class. I picture the great unending reach of the universe, or even just the immensity of our own earth, and suddenly nothing seems to matter as much.
There’s a danger in that too. When you approach the precipice of complete nihilism which one can draw too near at such times of shifting mental tectonics, there is a worry that suddenly nothing matters. I approach that line when I think about things too much. That’s when it’s best to refocus on the smaller bits of frivolity we find in this life, the little pieces of charm and enchantment that may not matter in the grand scheme of things, but which pass the day in a pleasing way.
