I too, feel checkout time is just around the corner, and although I'm not particularly looking forward to it, I'm not really dreading it either. I may not have done all I wanted to do, but I've pretty much taken care of everything I needed to do. I've taken care of all the loose ends as best I can, and made arrangements for the rest. I'm not afraid of the smiling mortician, all I care about is that it not hurt too much. I'm a coward when it comes to pain. My bills are paid up and I'm insured. What else can I do other than make sure the people I care about are taken care of? What else can anyone do?

But I too have a great curiosity about how we collectively handle what comes next. Will America survive Trump, or Clinton, for that matter? Will civilization survive climate change? Will we ever explore and settle the solar system? Will we ever make it to the stars? Will we ever encounter alien life? Alien intelligence? Will there be an abrupt jog in history, or will the past flow smoothly into the future? Is there going to be a future at all, or are we due for one of our periodic backslides?

These things do matter to me, not so much because they might affect me personally, but because I really do want to know.

Take care, Bowser. And remember you're not alone. In fact, we are all in this in the same way, we just don't all realize it at the same time.