To be fair though, when confronted by the sheer enormity of the distances between the stars, better minds than the one responsible for the Guide's introduction have faltered. Some invite you to consider for a moment a peanut in Reading and a small walnut in Johannesburg, and other sucuh dizzying concepts.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination.
Even light, which travels so fast that it takes most races thousands of years to realize that it travels at all, takes time to journey between the stars. It takes eight minutes to journey from the star Sol to the place where the Earth used to be, and four years more to arrive at Sol's nearest neighbor, Alpha Proxima.
For light to reach the other side of the Galaxy, for it to reach Damogran, for instance, takes rather longer: five hundred thousand years.
The record for hitchhiking this distance is just under five years, but you don't get to see much on the way.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy says that if you hold a lungful of air you can survive in the total vacuum of space for about thirty seconds. However, it does go on to say that what with space being the mind-boggling size it is the chances of getting picked up by another ship within those thirty seconds are two to the power of two hundred and seventy-six thousand, seven hundred and nine to one against.
By a totally staggering coincidence, that is also the telephone number of an Islington flat where Arthur once went to a very good party and met a very nice girl whom he totally failed to get off with--she went off with a gate-crasher.
Though the planet Earth, the Islington flat and the telephone have all now been demolished, it is comforting to reflect that they are all in some small way commemorated by the fact that twenty-nine seconds later Ford and Arthur are rescued.
Ah, coincidence. The chances of getting picked up by another spaceship within 30 seconds of being jettisoned into the vacuum of space being the telephone number of a flat in Islington where Arthur was humiliated by a girl. Coincidence. Yet, Arthur and Ford do get rescued within that 30 seconds. Their lives, and the rest of the novel, are saved.
I don't believe in coincidence. I think everything happens for a reason, even if we don't understand or know what that reason is. For instance, my job at the Surgery Center will disappear into the vacuum of space in about two or three weeks. Yes, this job loss is happening for purely economic reasons on the part of the huge health system that owns the Surgery Center. It's just business. That's what I've been told. (I'm not going to go on a rant about the soulless nature of the United States' healthcare system today. I'll save that for another day.) What I want to say is that, perhaps, this closure is happening for a reason.
I have no idea what that reason is. That's what I've been trying to figure out for over a month now. Very few people understand the strong connection I have with the place. That this surgery center was my sister's baby. She's been gone for almost four years now, but, in those four years, the surgery center she built was still in operation. So, in a way, she was still alive and breathing. Maybe this closure is forcing me to fully come to terms with my sister's death. Maybe.
Or perhaps there is a another career opportunity in the offing that I would have never considered if the surgery center was still open and operating. I'm kinda stubborn when it comes to change. Don't like it. If something is working for me, I see no need to alter my life in any way. My life was absolutely working for me. I was comfortable. I worked with two of my best friends at the surgery center. But one of those best friends got a new job about a year ago. She's gone. The other best friend will be moving away soon (let's say within months). Without these two people at the surgery center, there won't be a whole lot of joy for me. Time for me to weigh my options.
Or perhaps it really is just random bad luck. Like being jettisoned into outer space with no hope of survival. The pessimistic side of myself has been thinking along these lines for a while. The optimistic side of myself thinks this line of thought is bullshit. Catch me on a good day, and I'll tell you that the future is exciting and new. Catch me on a bad day, and I'll be drinking special hot chocolate and reading Cormac McCarthy's The Road.
This Sunday, at this moment, I'm leaning toward Cormac McCarthy. It's cold. The sky is gray. And there's a full bottle of Bailey's Irish Cream in my cupboard. That's the recipe for a good old-fashioned Irish wake.
In a few hours, Saint Marty may be singing "Danny Boy" at the top of his lungs.
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