Last month across India they celebrated Diwali and in a few days in the UK we are firing off fireworks left,right and centre to remember Guy Fawkes and later this November is Thanksgiving in the USA. Throughout the year there are thousands of celebrations all over the world which aim, apart from making lonely people feel even lonelier, to cement defining myths about the country and the people in the consciousness of the population. As well as make money on the gifts of course.
It should be asked why we think we need to do these things every year, and we find the year is a defining time scale for everything human beings do. Not only does it encompass a cycle in the growing year, it has come to be better understood as the cycle of the planet around the sun and in times to come it may even be further defined as we find other things that go on in the wider solar system and galaxy during, or close to that, time.
Years count down our lives. Form up into centuries and define the civilisations, the ages, which encompasses the story of humanity. Years have come to be the way in which we measure light, chart our personal success and give us guilt trips as the decades change. Yet a year is nothing. Not even memorable in the lifetime of the universe.
So important to us but as brief as the occasions we tick off during its passing.