Listening to Otis Redding at home during Christmas

Subtitled as "Why dates and distance markers matter to the human psyche."

Though the systems we use to describe arbitrarily long dates is arbitrary and thus meaningless we share one particular form of that arbitrary measurement in common for the most part across the world and nearly totally in the United States. That is the Gregorian Calendar. It is completely meaningless what form our shared measurement of time, especially vast distances of time (6 billion years ago Earth coalesced whatever the fuck that means) so the milemarkers, as it were, of anniversaries is important because it is a marker of one in the biggest meaningful marker we have in terms of our understanding of the concept of time. We almost definitely need a better understanding of time but the way we understand it now matters and years are our main marker of time. That's why people are 74 years old instead of 888 months old or whatever.

So the fact is that when the 27th anniversary of my mother giving birth to me, and the effects of all that that event means in my life, occurs, it will matter because it is a milemarker in my life that I can get a maximum amount of relatability out of. We can all understand and communicate pain in terms of years.

http://listen.grooveshark.com/#/song/Listening_to_Otis_Redding_at_Home_During_Christmas/14846238

At this link you can listen to song that I thin beautifully illustrates the point.

Here are the lyrics.

Home is where beds are made and butter is added to toast.

On a cold afternoon you can float room to room like a ghost.

Take the chess out and argue about who gets to set up the kings.

And I know that it's home because that's where the stereo sings

I've got dreams to remember. But not even home can be with you forever.

It's Christmastime and the plane flies me over white hills to a town in a dream,

where the sky is frozen and still, and a room (that's not mine but it's just like I left it before,

with the wax from the candles all dusty and locks on the door) where I held you so tenderly,

and where in summer I opened your letter to me. I'm standing where we knelt and a miracle mile now borders it, but if I turn my back and look at the field I don't even notice it for a second.

There's a tangle of greenery where winter scenery ends. And I hear that song sometimes and imagine us much more than friends -

like if we stayed in this town, bought the first house that went up on sale,

and how each Christmastime would bring inlaws and snowdays and holiday mail.

Your dad says you're living in Georgia since last September.

Well, I've got dreams to remember. I've got dreams to remember.

Oh Sara, come back to New Hampshire. We'll stay here forever.