Not long ago there lived a man by the name of Christopher.
Christopher was raised in a small town and lived there his entire life. One day
he got a letter, the return address was from a town he had heard his mother
speak of a few times, but the name was not familiar to him. With his curiosity sparked
he sat down to read the letter.
Dear Christopher,
My
name is Nestor, you have never met me before but I am your grandfather. First I
would like to say I am sorry that I have never been able to meet you. You see your
grandmother and I were never happy staying in one place for too long, your
mother on the other hand hated the constant moving, and came to loathe us for
it. When she met your father and fell in love she swore that she would never
put her child through such instability. She and your father moved to the small
town that you grew up in and she hasn’t talked to me since. Second I would like
to say that I am sorry I never will get the chance to meet you, by the time you
receive this letter I will have passed. However I have done for you the one
thing that I could. I have left to you my life savings, which are quite
substantial, in the hopes that you will use it to get out of that small town
and see the world and all its marvels.
Sincerely,
Nestor, your Grandfather
Upon
reading the letter Christopher felt incredibly overwhelmed. At first he didn’t know
what to think. Then as the whole thing sank in he began to realize that he had
never been far from his hometown, and he had certainly never left the country,
but he was reluctant to just up and leave on a trip around the world. He
decided that he would need a few days for him to figure this out and retired to
bed. The next morning as Christopher awoke everything seemed clear to him. He
realized that he could not deny his grandfather’s dying request, and set out
with a determination to see as much of the world as he possibly could.
He
traveled for years, seeing everything the world had to offer. He saw the Great Pyramids
of Giza, Stonehenge , the Coliseum. He walked on the Great Wall of China, and
he climbed the Leaning Tower of Pisa. He hiked to the depths of the Grand
Canyon and he swam in the Great Barrier Reef. He trekked through the amazon,
and he traveled to the poles to see both the northern and southern lights. He
traveled to every country in the world and took part in every culture that
exists.
When
he felt he had seen and experienced everything that there was to see or experience,
he set out on his final adventure. The last thing on his list was to climb to
the top of Mount Everest, to the very tip of the world. So this is exactly what
he did, and when he reached the summit he sat down and began to survey the
world from a view that few get to, as he began to think of everything he had
seen and done and how few people will get those experiences he began to realize
how blessed he was.
As
he was deep in thought the sun set and Christopher lay back and began to
examine the stars. He had never had much interest in Astronomy, but as he began
to gaze at the stars he realized that this was the clearest he had ever seen
the night sky. As he was looking from star to star he saw one of them simply
blink out of existence. As he marveled at this phenomenon he was reminded of
what one of his teachers said once, that if you ever see a star die remember
that it died millions, maybe billions of years ago, but it has taken that long
for the last of the light to travel to earth where you can see it. At that
moment he realized the true vastness of the universe.
Upon
this realization Christopher was stunned, and the man who thought he had
conquered all suddenly realized his own insignificance and became very ill at
ease.
