Tag: Light

The Shiny Guy

And a ray of contagious light, travelling the universe

Photo by Josh Boot on Unsplash

So, there was this guy. He was shining. A ray of bright light. All who bumped into him were touched by his light and for a while, became alight themselves, and this light was contagious.

When his time came and he left for a better place, they uncovered a diary he seemed to have been keeping. Not really a diary, more like bits and pieces of inner thoughts intertwined with some lament.

It turned out the guy had no light inside whatsoever. He had been walking in darkness the whole time. A deep well of despair and loneliness, a constant yet unfruitful search for an ever-elusive ray of sunshine. His writings left no doubt about it.

So where did the light come from? 

It came from every wrong turn he took because those who knew better never gave him the right advise.

It came from every piece of bread he would be denied when starving at the side of the road.

It came from every border he could not cross, every job he could not get, every opportunity he would lose because of who he was and where he came from.

It came from every failure, every broken dream, every sleepless night, it came from the indifference he had faced when most in need of human warmth.

You see, this guy was carrying the curse that others, more worthy of it, did not wish to carry. He was burdened with crying all the tears they would not cry anymore. 

A burden chosen with care, a curse embraced with full prior knowledge, for he had already been there before, took the wrong turn, cried the bitter tear, begged for a piece of bread, a job, an opportunity. He had been left outside in the cold when others were boarding first class. 

Broken dreams had been daily bread for as long as he could remember, and from the rumbles of his dreams and the ashes covering his days and nights, he found the strength to shine, not on others, but for others, to make their lives a little bit warmer. 

This constant shining got the best of him. He died of exhaustion on a sidewalk on a cold November evening.

Those who knew him quickly forgot hit legacy, if they ever knew it, and save for his writings, nothing remains of him today. 

Except, maybe, a ray of contagious light, still travelling the universe. 

Let the board sound

Rabih

Make a difference

You’re searching in the dark, you’re wandering for light
A blaze to which you’d walk, of which you’d feel the might
You’re writing in the shade, you barely see the mark
Of words through which you write a candle in the dark

These words which have laid there before the dawn of time
While waiting for a soul to pull them into rhyme
To keep from oblivion these tales of fireflies
And out of nothingness, to gift them to the skies

A craft many embrace but only few can tame
A true craftsman of words in this fine art has aim
He writes to heal the world, he writes to end the stray
With a handful of words, he’s got this much to say:

“Create, you will be blessed if your word people liked
Create, you will be whole even if you’re disliked
The curse? There’s only one, it’s called indifference
The cure? There’s hardly one, to make a difference.”

Let the board sound

Rabih

On a time twisting speed limit

“Let there be light”

Photo by Tsuyoshi Kozu

“Let there be light.” According to Genesis 1:3, this is how it all started. If we keep pulling on the metaphorical thread though, we might realize there is more to it.

It is by these words that the universe was stamped with a seal over which no trespassing is possible. This seal is the speed of light. It bears a name, c, and its value is known, 299 792 458 meters per second. A universal speed limit imposed on everything, or more precisely on anything which has mass, energy or which can hold information, so pretty much everything of interest. Nothing can go faster, not even light itself.

We only came to know about this seal in the beginning of the 20th century, when Einstein uncovered it in his theory of relativity. He discovered that it is an absolute limit, true everywhere, anywhere, regardless of the frame of reference you are in. A perfect boundary. A mind twisting one too, or rather a time twisting one. You see the higher the speed at which you travel, the slower time passes for you. Relativity again. The effect is tiny and beyond measurable for ordinary everyday speeds. It becomes dramatic however for speeds approaching c. Even time is not absolute in the vicinity of the ultimate speed limit.

We know today that there are hard limits in our universe, like the speed of light, the absolute zero or the uncertainty principle. Unlike previous epochs where so called science was rooted in the Scriptures, which lead the sun to revolve around the earth and Galilei’s life to jeopardy, these relatively modern limits are the fruits of scientific theories which have been experimentally verified over and again. They are as real as it gets. Bottom-line: Impossible is something, impossible is certain. Impossible is universal, by design may I say.

And maybe it is a good thing. It puts us back in perspective: our lives are too short to tame the impossible, but they are long enough to chase it: that’s called fundamental research for some, endeavor for others, adventure if you will, and that is what keeps dreams alive and humanity going forward.

To Maroun and Liliane

Let the board sound

Rabih

Whatever the cost

I tend to shy away from topics related to faith in my posts, as I believe it to be a very personal matter. This post will not create precedent from that respect. It is not really about faith, even if written from a faithful’s point of view. It is about guilty silence. It is about Omertà. About the moral imperative to break the silence and speak up when our brothers and sisters are in jeopardy. It is a call to do what is right whatever the cost when the innocent and the weak are at stake in our communities. And more so in a community of faithful.

So, dear reader, bear with me on this post if we do not share the same faith or even just faith, and more so if we do, for truth and doing the right thing are virtues which transcend faiths. Here I go.

You, shielding yourself from the truth, silent when you should have spoken, listen. Can you hear the inner voice?

 “Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free”

That’s black on white. A verse at the core of your faith. A verse you chose to ignore. Why? Do you dread the truth? Are you afraid to be blinded by the light?

Photo by Bruno van der Kraan

“I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness.“

What did you make of that other verse then? Is the world so dark that you forgot about the light? Or maybe you are betting on a prophecy. Ah, I see…

“And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.“

How convenient. But you see, this monument will not stand on its own, victorious against the gates of hell by virtue of some magic spell. This verse is to be read by the faithful not as a self-fulfilling prophecy but as an imperative: The gates of hell shall not prevail against it for YOU will stand in their way! There is no alternative. Reading it in any other way makes your faith a David Copperfield show. Pointless. The Almighty will not yield a magic wand to turn things around. He has better means for that: you!

And what have you done? Instead of protecting the innocent and the weak from the gates of hell, you have sheltered in your silence the fallen who dared to defile the most sacred of all.

“It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones.“

Not often does the Lord speak so harshly of someone in the Gospels you read every Sunday…

You already know the truth. Allow it now to set you free.

Let the board sound

Rabih