Today has been one of the first days that has truly come across as a fall day in Mississippi. The undeniable beauty of October. Wanting to flee the commerce of the strip mall where I was enjoying coffee and flirting with a sweet-as-can-be barista (did not want to fly from her, but a man often must choose peace of mind over a woman), I headed toward a nearby lake.

Thoughts:

My students (I pray that I am dead by this point) will encounter, um, situations that will not merely be different in degree but radically different in kind: for instance, human-robot “relationships.”

The coming displacement of most of the working force through automation may force us to see that life is more than a career.

Then again, the massive displacement of people through automation may lead to a crushing listlessness, robbing us of the will to live.

Can two people in the current sexual market place make it work if they have fundamentally different hobbies and interests? Granted, such a concern is a product of modernity because, for most of humanity’s existence, most people have not had the luxury to quibble about items that did not pertain directly to life and death and eternity. Still, this being said, unless we return to a more exigency-driven and religious way of life, there is no going back. We no longer identify ourselves through our families or religious communities; rather, we identify ourselves based on those pursuits from which we derive a non-necessary–but now seemingly an irremovable–gratification.

As of this morning, my biggest regret in life is never having had children. Not that such a possibility is now beyond the pale, but were I to have children, I would be an older (read: grumpier and less energetic) dad. However, I do not regret not having married, for I really do not know if I am a good partner or would make a good husband, but I know without a waning shadow of a doubt I would have been an amazing father.

Then again, is it essentially selfish to want to bring souls into this world primarily to dull the edges of my own mortality and soften the blow of my encroaching death? Yes, that is what humanity does, but are we justified in this?

Why am I single again?

Anyway, enjoy. I would love to waltz by a lake on nights like what, I trust, tonight will become.