I have often wondered what of me my children will remember. Will they remember how much I loved them?  Will they remember the many wonderful times we shared together?  And what of these memories will impact their life stories and the way they navigate through their own futures?  Will they take bits and pieces of us with them or will those bits and pieces eventually disappear like dried up leaves in the wind.

In Amy Harmon’s “What the Wind knows”, the author discusses this thought:  We were specks, bits of glass and dust.  We were as numerous as the sands that lined the strand, one unrecognizable from the other. We were born; we lived; we died.  And the cycle continued endlessly on.  So many lives lived. And when we died, we simply vanished.  A few generations would go by. And no one would know we even were. No one would remember the color of our eyes or the passion that raged inside us.  Eventually, we all became stones in the grass, moss covered monuments, and sometimes… not even that.

The idea of our temporary existence verses permanently leaving our mark within our small beloved circles of family and friends, or the expanded, larger circles of community, society and even the world is a question that I have pondered every now and then. Are we merely footprints in the sand, to be washed away with the next generational tide, erased as if we were almost never even here?  For how long will our descendants remember us?  Surely, one day all they will be left with are faded photographs with barely legible identity labels to mark our blurry once upon a time existence.

In contrast to our impermanent state, WORDS ARE forever.  The stories we write and read and share  leave immortal recordings of our adventures, passions, lessons, history, ideas, wisdom and narratives that transcend time like the stars in the sky, the waves in the ocean and the ancient trees inhabiting our state forests. From the Bible to ancient Greece’s Homer with his 8^th century “The Iliad” and “The Odyssey”- to Aesop’s famous fables, to Plato’s exploration of ideas, reality and the ideal society, to Aristotle’s pathos, ethos and logos, and all the other great works of literature lining book shelves everywhere, words were written, read, analyzed and preserved for their present day readers as well as for future audiences, providing an infinite promise of timeless and profound effect on our lives.  

Prominent English writer, William Hazlitt once said; Words are the only things that last forever; they are more durable than the eternal hills. What truly shapes the world is not the physical landscapes we esteem or the material possessions we value and accumulate over time, but the written ideas and stories we grow from our hearts and our ever curious minds, that we pass down, read and remember that enriches our connection to one another and our creator, that honors our similarities and differences, and immortalizes our love for one another- that is most important and eternal.

In the Writer Digest January/February interview with world-renowned astrophysicist and author, Neil deGrasse Tyson, contributing author Zachary Petit asks Mr. deGrasse Tyson to describe how he came to love words;  Words can have influence beyond just the dictionary definition of their meaning, because when you string words together in a particular way, the sum of the sequence of words is greater than what they would weigh individually.  He later discusses why he feels the world needs poets (artists of words -or writers), he says I don’t need you to poeticize something that is already a visual spectacle achievement of this species.  Those are not the times I need an artist. You know when I need an artist? When I forgot how to pay attention to something, when I forgot how to love, when I forgot how to see the beauty in something that’s hidden in plain sight. And you force me, by the string of words, to take pause and say, “Wow, I never thought about it that way. It is more beautify than I ever realized, or it is beautiful in a way I never thought it was.”

In my own home office I have a frame on my book shelf displaying author Zadie Smith’s quote: The very reason I write is so that I might not sleepwalk through my entire life.  It is through the words we thread together that we uncover and give meaning to the way we see life, the way we feel life, the way we mold life and the way we live it.  By paying attention to and placing value on our surroundings- the people, places, events, and emotions and ideas in our world and by writing about it -we craft what Neil deGrasse Tyson says artists do so perfectly:  For me, he says, access to beauty requires an artist because they see things that are otherwise invisible to the rest of us. Words have that special magic to capture and magnify all kinds of beauty and to bring that beauty to life- and even further- to shield it from the aging process that eventually erodes, destroys or erases everything else.

However, while words can be timeless pieces of art, to be honored, admired and valued for years to come, they can also cause pain and irrevocable damage when thrown about impulsively, carelessly or in a moment of weakness, when shaped without thoughtful consideration for the consequent influence they might have.  Despite our modern technology that makes it easy to delete or erase regretful words on a screen, there will almost always be a permanent footprint left somewhere in the universe with the potential to leave behind a heart broken, a friendship cost, a promise not kept, an act of wrong-doing or any number of non-intentional results that have ever- lasting effects. Words are treasures to be valued- never to be taken for granted or abused.

We are here -for the minute our creator gave us- living as real- life characters in our own hybrid of autobiographical-fictional life stories, and as fleeting as our time is here, it is up to us to make that time inspiringly and optimistically meaningful in some way or somewhere- for someone- or some-ones- with our words…  The right words…The best words….The words that earn the right to outlive us.

 Like the fourth of July fireworks, with their short-lived but impactful bursts of red, blue, purple and gold that dazzle the smooth dark sky, we peak and then we fizzle out, ultimately disappearing from sight.  Like temporary puddles after a hard rain so very present in those moments, we too will eventually evaporate from the earth’s surface, one day gone with little to no trace of our existence.

And like footprints in the sand, we too will wash away over time while the words we leave behind will linger far into the future, long after the tides have been here and gone.