Dani Tiedemann
15 years old 11/4/12
Nothing
is Built to Last. Not Really
Why is it that every single moment
of history all over the world people continuously try and try again to build
something to last forever? They always fail. No matter if it’s a building, a
monument, a government, or a religion, we have never succeeded in our goal. But
we keep trying. Forever and ever will the human race attempt to create
something that’s time-proof. Something that will be preserved until the end of
the universe itself. It may be a name, a war, an invention, or an idea. No
matter what somebody out there is trying to find a way to etch it into the
stars. Why? What’s the point? We know we can never succeed. Nothing is
time-proof. Nothing is meant to last forever. Nothing.
Many religions foresee an end even to the universe. An end to all of time and space and life and death. Not even time is time-proof. These beliefs have formulated an event where their God shall save those remaining from the inevitable nothingness. There is a place beyond the stars that keeps us from fading away. Our kind cannot bear to imagine that someday everything will die and be forgotten. We created a heaven where we can go when our life; our accomplishments, memories, legacies, and remnants, begin to fade. Humans can't accept that we ourselves will one day fall from existence. Nothing is built to last. Not even us. People can continue to plunder our earth without rational thought about how dependent we are on this planet. The human race will always survive. We can adapt right? No. We smother the singular life force that we need in order to move forward on our path to greater things. But we don’t understand how impossible eternity really is.
Political messages lately circle on an idea “Make this country built to last”. We can build a building or a government to last a very, very long time and fool ourselves that very, very long is even close to permanent. But in the end, nothing is built to last. Not really. Just because it took years to create doesn’t mean it can last forever. Our universe was formed in mere moments and so far that is the closest thing to forever we can dream. And even our universe wasn’t built to last. Our country’s splendor and power will shift and die someday. Maybe even sooner than we think.
There are noteworthy splits in rich and poor, republican and democratic, man and woman, catholic and protestant, atheist and religious. Splits that have proved time and time again throughout history to signify the end of a paradise. The death of an empire. That old saying? Rome wasn’t built in a day. It wasn’t. It took thousands of people and hundreds of years and millions of failures and obstacles to build Rome. They said Rome was built to last. They had no way of knowing, since back then Rome was the strongest city ever built before. They had no way of knowing that Rome wasn’t timeless. That saying leaves out some things. Rome wasn’t built in a day. But it burned in less than a week. Nothing is built to last. The society collapsed and the empire crumbled from within. No back up plans were made. Nobody knew how quickly something that seemed so strong could break apart so quickly. Nobody knew how dependent they were on that city to be permanent. Nobody knew. Europe did not recover from the fall of the Roman Empire for a thousand years.
And now again that event didn’t last to have an effect on the minds today. We don’t remember how easy it is for something seemingly unbeatable to fall and break. Nothing is built to last. Not really. We can't forget that. No matter how hard we try and how strong it looks, nothing is built to last. So if nothing, not even the universe and time itself, is built to survive time, why do we keep trying so hard? Why?
Time kills everything. Even itself in the end. But the human race has always been the dreamers. The believers and the doers. What keeps us going is that little sliver of hope that what we build during our short, insignificant lives. A hope that in our lives we helped build something strong. Something that maybe just maybe can defy that inevitable nothingness.
Something at least worthy of lasting forever.
Many religions foresee an end even to the universe. An end to all of time and space and life and death. Not even time is time-proof. These beliefs have formulated an event where their God shall save those remaining from the inevitable nothingness. There is a place beyond the stars that keeps us from fading away. Our kind cannot bear to imagine that someday everything will die and be forgotten. We created a heaven where we can go when our life; our accomplishments, memories, legacies, and remnants, begin to fade. Humans can't accept that we ourselves will one day fall from existence. Nothing is built to last. Not even us. People can continue to plunder our earth without rational thought about how dependent we are on this planet. The human race will always survive. We can adapt right? No. We smother the singular life force that we need in order to move forward on our path to greater things. But we don’t understand how impossible eternity really is.
Political messages lately circle on an idea “Make this country built to last”. We can build a building or a government to last a very, very long time and fool ourselves that very, very long is even close to permanent. But in the end, nothing is built to last. Not really. Just because it took years to create doesn’t mean it can last forever. Our universe was formed in mere moments and so far that is the closest thing to forever we can dream. And even our universe wasn’t built to last. Our country’s splendor and power will shift and die someday. Maybe even sooner than we think.
There are noteworthy splits in rich and poor, republican and democratic, man and woman, catholic and protestant, atheist and religious. Splits that have proved time and time again throughout history to signify the end of a paradise. The death of an empire. That old saying? Rome wasn’t built in a day. It wasn’t. It took thousands of people and hundreds of years and millions of failures and obstacles to build Rome. They said Rome was built to last. They had no way of knowing, since back then Rome was the strongest city ever built before. They had no way of knowing that Rome wasn’t timeless. That saying leaves out some things. Rome wasn’t built in a day. But it burned in less than a week. Nothing is built to last. The society collapsed and the empire crumbled from within. No back up plans were made. Nobody knew how quickly something that seemed so strong could break apart so quickly. Nobody knew how dependent they were on that city to be permanent. Nobody knew. Europe did not recover from the fall of the Roman Empire for a thousand years.
And now again that event didn’t last to have an effect on the minds today. We don’t remember how easy it is for something seemingly unbeatable to fall and break. Nothing is built to last. Not really. We can't forget that. No matter how hard we try and how strong it looks, nothing is built to last. So if nothing, not even the universe and time itself, is built to survive time, why do we keep trying so hard? Why?
Time kills everything. Even itself in the end. But the human race has always been the dreamers. The believers and the doers. What keeps us going is that little sliver of hope that what we build during our short, insignificant lives. A hope that in our lives we helped build something strong. Something that maybe just maybe can defy that inevitable nothingness.
Something at least worthy of lasting forever.
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