Somewhere Near Zero

       Ex nihilo nihil fit. Nothing comes from nothing.

            And, as Maria and Captain Von Trapp sing so tenderly, “nothing ever could.”

            The closest number to zero is 0.0000....001, with an infinite amount of zeroes between the decimal and the one. It's the closest value before there is no value. The number is infinitesimal. It's only the tiniest, tiniest smidgen of existence neighboring zero.

             I'm not a mathematician, and I'm not a philosopher. I don't understand what I'm writing about. And yet, this value is fascinating. It's just so close to being nothing, but it isn't. It is valued as something, because it isn't nothing. But it's so close... What a fine line of existence!

             I wonder if everything is this close to “zero,” if everything is as close to nothingness as this number. My mind, my shoes, that ice that crunches under my shoes on my way to work; how close is All to not existing at all?

            What is the divide between existence and nothingness? How big is the divide?

             Maybe nothingness and existence are completely separate, like when the real world is reflected in a mirror. One cannot enter the mirror. The reflection in the mirror only exists because the objects it is reflecting exist. Maybe nothingness is, only because things exist. Existence cannot pass into nothingness, and nothingness cannot pass into existence. Perhaps existence and nothingness are separate values... Wait, why does the universe exist in such polar, yet inseparable, pairs?

*pop*

              Did you hear that? I think it was the sound of my brain fizzling out.

              There's probably something wrong with my musings above, and that's okay. I feel like I am at an aquarium with my face pressed against the glass of some large tank, and all I can see is blue haze. I was told there would be fish in the tank, but there aren't any. I am drained as I strain to find significance. 

               To put on a scale from 0 to 10 how much I gleaned from this ramble, 0 being nothing and 10 being something, I'd gage this ramble to be somewhere near zero. Perhaps as close to zero as a number can be, without being zero... 

               Let's not go there again. Instead, Maria and the Captain:

"For here you are, standing there, loving me

Whether or not you should

So somewhere in my youth or childhood

I must have done something good

“Nothing comes from nothing

Nothing ever could

So somewhere in my youth or childhood

I must have done something good”

                Often I strain to find significance only to have significance flirt with the fingertips of my pitiful, grasping hands. When I do finally find meaning, I feel like I'm being passed scraps under the table while the Gods feast above me. I am grateful, but I am not satisfied. 


               Then again, nothing comes from nothing... Huh. Maybe I am doing something good.