not watching the perseids

it is past midnight.  i have the windows open.  the cats are calming down [cats being nocturnal creatures].  each time i get up for some reason i look out the window to the night sky hoping to catch a meteor.  fat chance.  the perseids are out doing their thing.  i think.  it is the time of year for the annual meteor shower.  but each day every day all year long there are hundreds of rocks from deep and not so deep space that enter our atmosphere and burn up before they hit our earth.  you want to know where the best place is to watch for meteors? at the drive-in.  say you are deep into the second feature.  it is after midnight.  you are on your second or third beer.  your right hand is deep in the bag of cheetos. your eyes wander from the screen.  you look up and lo!  there you see a brilliant light across the sky.  that light lasts but a second or two. if that.  such a sight is proof the universe is vast and beyond our ken.  meteors are only rocks, from space.  only rocks.  what could be more ordinary.  and yet. . .and yet they are evidence of a greater reality, one that is more magnificent than is dreamt of in our philosophy.  tonight i feel each time i take a piss and look outside my window i am missing something.  these rocks that are part of our universe eons older than the earth.  and then i think what can be more ordinary than meteors hurtling toward somewhere and something.  rocks are everywhere, on earth and in space.  only by their light may we glance upon an eminence.  for only a second or two.  instead i reconcile myself to my education.  i know the perseids are there.  if i stare at our sky for long enough i'll seee them.  but doing so is not a proof of existence.  rather i'll go to bed, draw up the sheets, read a few pages of the book on my nightstand, and know that the rocks of the universe are there.  like i am here.  for a while.  still.