There would always be a fire in the pit, not for warmth or to roast an ox, but because since the invention of time humans have gathered in circles to gaze into the flames and ponder their mysteries. My friend said, "Every cabin in the woods needs an outdoor fire pit."
And now my friend's wife and the newspaperman have both passed away. Early one morning, unable to sleep, I roamed my memories of them. Of an endless series of dinners, and brunches, and poker games, and jokes, and gossip. On and on, year after year. I remember them. They exist in my mind--in countless minds. But in a century the human race will have forgotten them, and me as well. Nobody will be able to say how we sounded when we spoke. If they tell our old jokes, they won't know whose they were.
That is what death means. We exist in the minds of other people, in thousands of memory clusters, and one by one those clusters fade and disappear. Some years from now, at a funeral with a slide show, only one person will be able to say who we were. Then no one will know.
- Roger Ebert
Read more here...
http://www.rogerebert.com/rogers-journal/i-remember-you
- Ikhide