ALWAYS GOING SOMEWHERE

"Saturday Race', oil,
by Thaw Malin III

     In my busy teenage years, I recall my mother often saying that I was “always going somewhere”, and, in a weird sort of way, I still am. Actually, I have no choice, since everything in this universe is constantly stirring or shifting or racing. There is no such thing as standing still, no matter what my eyes might seem to tell me. Even when I’m sitting in my laziest way, all my cells are transforming in a swift and unceasing manner. Also, the electrons in the hydrogen atoms that compose a sizeable part of my body are traveling fast enough, physicists say, to circle the earth in 18 seconds, and the planet I’m spending my life on is soaring around the sun at something like 67,000 miles per hour. Plus, even while I’m doing my morning meditation in the steadiest silence and serenity, the solar system I belong to is barreling around the Milky Way at close to 600,000 miles per hour.     

     So yes, mom, in this astonishing life you gave me, I’m still always going somewhere.