grey is the new black

there is a common, colloquial usefulness to words like good and bad, right and wrong. "you were so right to deck that kid." "that cologne just smells bad." these are very handy black and white-isms to quickly describe the positive from the negative.

so, let's go back to atomic, particulate problems. they keep on finding smaller and smaller things. we had atoms. then pro- and neutrons, with electrons to boot. we've got ourselves quarks now, too, and their gluons. and now soon these quarks will show to have substructure? good grief, where does it end?

ah, but lullaby my poor human head and tell me no, it never ends. where my hopeless lack of faith in gods leaves a void, it's overflowing with the infinite. tell me size doesn't matter - we can always just cut it in half again. tell me i don't know from big. bigger than a breadbox? bigger than a baby's arm? tell me things can't even be big or small, because scales can't exist on continuous relativity. tell me things just keep keepin on and on, and that i may never understand what that can possibly mean.

right and wrong. good and bad. how can these things really exist in the same place as infinity? where does the buck stop? how can something be completely right or completely wrong in a world that extends forever in every direction? this all lead to a wonderful grey scale. a fog that thickens and dissipates, but never lifts dry. never saturates. and is not linear! look up and a dark cloud circles, heavy with fogbits. to the right, a patch of space almost arid. and changing! look again and reference points disappear at a nauseating pace. how to classify in a nebula: ridiculous!

was it good to leave oregon? was it wrong to steal office supplies? right politics? bad religion? killing, conceiving? we've got circumstance, perspective, chance. this choose-your-own-adventure is less of a choice and more the inevitability of possibility. i sleep better knowing i know less and less.