Immortality

One's form cannot last forever.

I want to persist forever. Someday I will die, and the thought of ceasing to exist, of my body and memory fading away until nothing remains, absolutely nothing, raises such terror in my throat that I fear I will choke. My name will fade. My ashes will scatter. My mind will cease. Time will turn me into something insignificant.

The void is as terrifying as it is vast. I enjoy life and all the pleasures that come with it. I want to believe that my experiences and actions have meaning. I want to leave something behind, something that will prove that I was here, that I existed, that I was an individual who did SOMETHING with his life other than perish in mediocrity.

Look how far we as a race have come in one hundred years! In a decade! In a week, even! I want from the bottom of my soul to see where we will go, what we will do, how we will send up a flare into the dark to burst and scream “Yes! We are here! Even if only for a moment, we are HERE!”

Rather, it is something of my making, a tangible, quantifiable, recognizable piece of my soul, that I must hope to somehow create in my lifetime. What form might this creation take? I do not yet know. Perhaps a book, or a song, or a saved life. Whatever the case, I will dedicate the rest of my life to its creation. For to give form to such a hope would mean immortality, and for immortality my life is a small price to pay.