Scientific oneness

This week, while I was finally oiling the third and littlest of the ‘Still-a-Life’ sculptures, I also happened to be reading an article in Resurgence magazine by Deepak Chopra that brought a new awareness to me about just what I was actually applying tung oil to:

“….It is possible today to compute the total number of atoms in the atmosphere on planet Earth. It’s possible to compute what you are inhaling and exhaling in one breath. With a little more calculation, we can show—beyond a shadow of doubt—that right this moment you have in your physical body at least a million atoms that were once in the body of Christ, or the Buddha, or Michelangelo, or Leonardo da Vinci, or Saddam Hussein, or Osama bin Laden, or George Bush. You have a million atoms right now that have been in the body of every single being that has existed since the dawn of creation. In just the last three weeks a quadrillion atoms (quadrillion means ten followed by fifteen zeros) have gone through your body and they have gone through the body of every other living species on this planet. So think of anything in the ecosystem right now—think of a tree in Africa, think of a squirrel in Siberia, think of a peasant in China, think of a taxi-driver in Calcutta, think of a small child in Afghanistan—and you have raw material in your body that was circulating there only three weeks ago. In less than one year you replace ninety-eight per cent of all the atoms in your body….”

“….At the atomic level you make a new liver every six weeks; a new skin once every five days; you replace your skeleton every three months; and you replace the raw material of your DNA every six weeks—it comes and goes like migratory birds….”

Awesome.

I look out my window. There stands a native olive tree in a grove of silver peppermint trees. A wattle bird flits through; a wallaby chews on a spear of sagg grass. In the distance the ocean is calm where last week five humpback whales frolicked.

Oven on the dining room table the group of three ‘Still-a-Life’ wait to be photographed.