Characters from Father in My Name

“In a way,” Ava said, “we hardly know ourselves. Our senses are limited, our brains are biased, and our instruments are imprecise. Even all of visible matter is just a tiny fraction of what exists. Think about dark matter and dark energy. Think about all the hypotheses that haven’t been tested or can’t be tested in our lifetimes. Our bodies of knowledge are not only incomplete. They’re changing with every approximation, with every rigorous study. The more we learn, the more mysteries arise in the universe. To me, that’s the greatest realization. Discovering how insignificantly small we are in the cosmos while knowing we’re the cosmos too. We are what we’re looking for. We believe we’re so separate from everything, but we’re all connected in this moment, changing, always changing, but never capable enough to realize the immensity of existence itself. Our mammalian brains will never comprehend our interconnection to everything. We’re waves in an ocean and we don’t truly understand how deep that ocean can go.”

“I’ve got priorities, man,” said Johnnie. “I get to choose the order of things I don’t give a fuck about.”