Of what value is a civilization that can't toast a piece of bread as ordered?

I was dying. Like all the other people who live in this world.

We were young, and we had no need for prophecies. Just living was itself an act of prophecy.

An expectation was there, mixed in with so many other emotions - excitement, resignation, hesitation, confusion, fear - that would well up then wither on the vine. You're optimistic one moment, only to be racked the next by the certainty that it will all fall to pieces. And in the end it does.

The sun sliced through the windshield, sealing me in light. I closed my eyes and felt the warmth on my eyelids. Sunlight traveled a long distance to reach this planet; an infinitesimal portion of that sunlight was enough to warm my eyelids. I was moved. That something as insignificant as an eyelid had its place in the workings on the universe, that the cosmic order did not overlook this momentary fact.

Life doesn't require ideals. It requires standards of action.

Mental acuity was never born from comfortable circumstances.