Rumi Nations

No. It's not about THAT. Nothing HAPPENED on the dinner table. In fact, I don't have one. And that's the point. It occurred to me out of the blue about the fact that I do not own a dinner table while most people do. (Of course, when one talks of India, probably it would be truer to say that most people in fact don't.) But clearly the readers of this blog would likely belong to the dinner table owning class. So, the point is this: how essential is it to own a dinner table? Does one's quality of life degrade in any noticeable manner (let alone significant manner) on account of not owning a dinner table?  Clearly, the stark fact has to do with our sense of priorities.  We make these choices and so many of them. Some of these choices are conscious and some are unconscious. There are individual choices made and societal ones too. Individuals choose to worry over dresses or dining tables or door frames or dogs or whatever.

For Sagan, talking about Mars must be as familiar territory as one's 'back of the hand' to use an old saying. Sagan coveres the history and evolution of our understanding of the Red Planet. All the expected stuff such 'The War of the Worlds' by H. G. Wells to famous Martian canals 'discovered' by Perceval Lowell. Sagan talks about Robert Goddard and Konstantin Tsiolkovsky. And then the modern age of Martian exploration with the Mariner landings. And what an awesome achievement that is! Audacious and impossible-sounding dreams of a century ago are a banal reality today. Sagan describes the topography and geology and ecology of Mars — about how it came to be a cold and barren planet in spite of having conditions that are seemingly clement for life to arise. The search for life on Mars continues of course. I am sure like Sagan that one day we'll be the Martians — and all that that implies. I look forward to unmanned aerial vehicles flying in the thin Martia...