Relative Something

I find it interesting to contemplate the coincidence of timing for significant events, and how the measure of significance is a relative one. What is deemed to be newsworthy changes quickly, but the events play out anyway, regardless the attention paid. The impact of death of an individual is lost to all but the closest people, if it happens at the same time that thousands are killed in a catastrophe.

Political conflicts, where interested parties often struggle for attention to bolster their cause, fall off the radar in the shadow of cataclysms that demand response from countries around the world.

Today there are people facing the prospect of not having any clean water to drink, their world in shambles, rumbling with aftershocks and a looming nuclear meltdown. I cannot think of one significant thing in my life that doesn’t pale in comparison. What may have been important to me last week, just doesn’t hold that same measure in comparison to events in Japan.

May all of our petty concerns be revealed for the trivial nature they really are, every day, regardless the number of coincident catastrophes that come about to present more dramatic reference.