A Thunderstorm

A storm is brewing outside. The thunder, a show of lights, covers our archipelago. There is electricity in the air, you can feel it, and smell it. Something is about to happen tonight, and you know it. There is a haunting silence in the streets, and no one dares to talk about the spectacle of flashing racers up ahead. You are very naive and passive, might as well continue with your routine. Anyway, it was a long day at work, didn't have much time to rest and have a break. You'd rather go back home, with no care in the world, and sit on the sofa, have a hot drink and turn on the TV set.

Well, it is at this moment you realize it's beginning. Your TV set explodes as your turn it on. A lightning strike has finally decided to emerge from the clouds, and it has hit your home. The silent dancing of the brightly vivid skies breaks down into a chorus of fierce rains. The air ripples with the sound of lightning. The wrath of a thousand storms is unleashed, and you sit there, on the sofa, looking rather astonished at the sparks coming out of the hole in the middle of your TV set.

You jump up and run across the corridor. There is no light showing you the way, the power supply to your home has been cut off, burnt, by a single lightning bolt. That is the force with which a thousand other bolts hit the island that day. It is the force with which nature makes us cower. Revere it, even, so that we feel vulnerable when our technology is dwarfed by the power of the Earth. You find a way to the kitchen, and manage to grab a torch. You turn it on, and point it at the window, ominously standing in front of you, the only barrier between your shivering body, inside, and the crackling storm drenching into your backyard.

Another flash of light expands through the blackness of the room into a hundred hues of white. The echo of its rage follows, and it shudders you. Your knees fail, and you stumble. Slowly, the room turns black again, and you slip into unconsciousness.

Light pours into your eyes, burning them slightly, as you exert force to open them. You manage to crawl up onto your feet, and look around. Your room is well lit again. It is morning, and the storm has passed. Across the corridor you walk, and out through the door. A breeze of fresh air blows into you, scented with the calmness that pervades your surroundings.

It is the calamity of the storm, now a  composure of nature. A subtle quietness and a silence, ensuing the symphony of Life.

Half Full or Half Empty?

There is a cup half filled on the table, and I ask my mother; 'Is the cup half full, or half empty?'

This is a question most of us have come across, and usually the most logical answer would be to say that it is half full. The diligent observer and thinker would then argue that it depends on your viewpoint. This individual would say that an optimist considers the cup half full, while the pessimist sees it as half empty, even though, the significance of the contents of the cup are really not important, and so this argument is quite irrelevant in my opinion.

Later on you ask this question to a keener observer, a scientist. The scientist replies, to your astonishment, that the cup is mostly empty, around 90% to be more precise, and you remain puzzled. What does he mean by the cup being mostly empty, when it is clearly filled by half? You ask the scientist to explain, and he replies, rather proud of being aware of such details.

Everything in the universe is made up of atoms, little tiny particles that can form a solid, let's say a chair, when they are moving very slowly or a gas, like the one we breathe in, when they are moving fast. Atoms can also have an intermediate phase, a liquid, to form something like water. Well, it doesn't stop there. For you see, an atom is made up of tinier denizens. There is the pessimistic, negatively charged electron, the optimistic, positively charged proton, and the neutral passive neutron. These are the three particles that make up each atom in everything around us, from the shirt you are wearing, to the skin it is covering, to the moon in the night sky.

There is more to the story, however, and it comes to a big surprise to know that an atom, is mostly empty space. You see, an atom is always made up of protons and neutrons clustered up together as a group in the middle and an electron, or electrons, running around them in circles. Let's say you are standing in the middle of an Olympic stadium. You are the proton, a happy guy talking to neutrons in the middle of the pitch. Then there are the energetic little electrons zipping by, running around the course track. The size of the atom, or its radius, is defined by how far the electron is, from the group in the middle of the stadium. That means, that everything which is made up of atoms, which is, ironically, everything, is defined, or made up of electrons running around, and at a large distance away from, the middle of atoms. The space in between the electron and you, the proton in the middle, is empty space.

This empty space, is nothing like the air we can wave our hands through. Air is made up of gaseous atoms,  spaced apart from each other, moving fast between your fingers. The space in between the electron and the proton, on the other hand, is really empty. This empty space, amounts to around 90% of the total volume of atoms. This means, that the tip of a pencil, made out of carbon atoms, is 90% empty space, and this applies to every thing around us. So, you ask, how come we do not fall through our chair, into the Earth and through all this empty space which is in every thing.

Well, you have to consider that every thing is made up of atoms, and as such, has electrons, buzzing around it. Electrons are pessimists, negatively charged dudes that don't like talking very much to each other. When the atoms at the tip of my finger, and the electrons they are made up of, are pressed to a wall, my finger does not pass straight through the wall, because it meets other pessimistic electrons on the atoms of the wall, who repel my finger electrons. Similarly, the electrons on my bum repel those on the chair, and I can safely 'hover' on the chair, and never fall through it. So much for flying, we do it all the time. About those superhero fans that prefer their characters to pass through walls...well, I'm sorry for them.

And so we can come to the conclusion of our story. When my mother replied with 'Half Full', to the question imposed about the mythical dilemma of the cup, she wasn't wrong, but she wasn't exactly right. To the scientist, or those people who have wondered and had the time to ponder and learn the marvellous mysteries of our universe, the answer is, it is mostly empty. And what would be the coolest answer to give in a bar as a pick up line? You decide.

Edit 14/10/12 - Typos

The Cottage

There on a hill, half covered in white, I see a cottage. Black fumes dance in the cold wind as they ascend up through a moss-covered chimney. The sound of crackling timber pierces through the silent sleep of this forgotten place. No being is in sight, no bird flapping its wings, nothing is around, except for an evergrowing sense of belonging.

This pile of wood, built wholeheartedly with passion and devotion, in a barren landscape, surrounded by a blanket of mountains, emanates warmth. It pleads to be discovered, observed. It whispers to me to enter, to learn its secrets. Yet, somehow, I already know what I will find. Its as if I have already been here. As if this was my home, or is it still?

I tremble as I turn the door knob. Its cold and it burns, but the heat from the other side rests on the wood, inviting me inside. I accept and walk in, with a smile on my face like that of a fragile newborn cradled in sheets of attention. One bed, a chair and a lit fireplace, is all there is to see. So simple, so mundane, yet so eloquent.

This place, I remember. I lived here, grew inside these four walls which I, myself had built. I had tucked away the adjectives, the colours, the music, impregnated an idea into a fragile setting. I gave warmth to the only recluse I constructed, made a beacon out of it, a refuge to escape to, when in need of reflection. This is where I belong, yet I doubt.

What if  willows and oaks, butterflies and chirping robins, a river and a carpet of jaded grass beheld my decaying household? Is it wrong to dream of such a place, where it is not the home that gives comfort but what lies outside of it? Maybe it is time to burn the cottage on the hill, and build another one, in a garden, not in ice.

And the door shall never close and lock the heat inside, for the warmth shall come from all the flapping of the wings and the whistling of the wind and the gurgling of the water flowing downstream. For a symphony shall be played, and all listeners invited, and for them to paint on the walls with colours of their choice they are encouraged. 

For the cottage, which is my soul, shall be rebuilt with adjectives and colours and a new dogma written on the front door; 'From the ashes we are born and to it we will return. So do not doubt, but rejoice and  find pleasure in the simple things in life, for what is more beautiful than to live and feel all that which we are part of'.

Self-Thoughts

One day I was walking by and saw a flower. It was bright red, with a yellow wasp pollinating it. At that moment, a question struck me; why red and why yellow? How come we can only perceive only three main colours, and if we could ‘see’ all the spectrum of waves, why would it only be limited to such? Shouldn't there be an infinite number of different colours which we cannot understand? Then I realized it’s not just colours. There are various limitations in our universe, as if set, as if put inside the universe by a god. The dissociation constant of water, quantum states, charges…all of these can be deduced, and always give the same results, but why? 

Surely, the universe did not ‘decide’ what to choose. Well, the answer is, it did not, but it was forced to. What we perceive (our universe), has such a state, and we can only calculate as such, and if we ask why there aren’t variables, maybe there are, but it’s not this specific universe. Some may stipulate that such constant factors in our universe can only be as such because the universe would not be able to exist otherwise. But that, to me, is a narrow-minded answer. 

If there are an infinite number of universes in existence, then there surely must be an infinitesimal number of observable universes with different constants, different colours which we, as humans, cannot comprehend…and maybe, something even more…something beyond senses – not colours, not tastes, not touch and not smells. We, as humans living in this universe, are limited to what we have been evolved to observe, but there should (there is) an infinite number of possibilities out there. The thought of such a possibility and the limitation of it in our universe is evidence of such.

9/11

9/11.
It is a date very well known to westerners. A day of grief, of anger, of feeling vulnerable. It is a day many people still recall clearly, with all TV news broadcast streaming the event on that day. It is a day on which lives were lost, families broken, tears shed. But what effect would such a day have on a little boy, living hundreds of kilometers away, soon 10,  have in his budding life?

It is said that all human beings are connected. We are subjected to a universal sense of brotherhood. Our lives all affect one another. We share happiness and sadness daily, be it with friends or family. The act of sharing emotions echos through society from one person to another, such that a warm smile in the morning can brighten your day, so can a cold shoulder make you feel neglected, thus affecting your attitude towards others you will thereafter meet. This interconnectivity of human emotion extends farther than anyone, even me, could have fathomed. I now truly believe, that due to our technological advancement, and globalization, human emotions are shared on a global scale, such that the Earth's population is one big family. 

When man landed on the moon in 1969, a global sense of unity was felt. Man had ventured out into space, and it didn't matter what race or what country did it first, the point was 'Man' did, and their was an uproar of joy and content in our achievement. Similarly, when we are part of a global catastrophe, like a tsunami or an earthquake, we feel sad for each other, help each other, do whatever it takes to preserve human life. The act of terrorism on 9/11 was perceived by humans as a threat to their safety and existence. And even though it did not directly affect every person on the planet, anyone who came to know of the event felt pain for all the lost souls resulting from an evil act of few people. However, it affected me, a ten year old boy, very differently, from most of the people I talk to.

I am writing this account to preserve the memory of 9/11 in the cloud - for maybe a day may come when I'm right about certain things or else I could explain what happened.

It is very easy to assign what I felt to a random chance or coincidence, but this is the truth:

On the morning of 9/11, my family was preparing to leave a hotel in which we were spending that particular weekend. I do not recall the exact time of the event, but as we were moving things out into the car, my father and sisters already in the car ready to leave, and my mother four steps infront of me, walking towards our vehicle, I felt a sharp sting in my heart. It was as if my heart caved in on itself. I felt a sense of emptiness, as if a vacuum was created inside my chest. This only lasted very briefly, maybe less then a second, but it had never happened to me, and I called out to my mother. Then, for no apparent logical reason (I have been pondering this ever since), I told my mum; "I think something has happened. Something bad. And it could be outside of Malta". Obviously, when mentioning something bad, I wasn't referring to the pain I felt in my heart, she didn't even know about that. I was referring to an event, bad in nature, such as an earthquake or a tsunami. This, however, turned out to be the terrorist attacks of 9/11 2001.

I only got to know of the attacks later that day when we went to our grandma's after our weekend break. We were all very sad and left in shock and the live footage of the rescuers and the dust clouds, and at the footage of the planes heading straight into the buildings. Myself, on the other hand, did not take note of the strange thing I had told my mum earlier. I only got to really ponder what happened years later, and each time a documentary crops up or an anniversary of the tragedy, I feel very emotional, sad, and depressed. For I KNEW something happened on that day, but I still could have done nothing. So the questions remained: 'Why did I feel the way I did?', 'Could I have felt a churning emotion on the global scale?' 'If we still cannot do anything in regards to something like this, why are we possibly subjected to a global awareness?'

And so my quest to find out the truth continues...