A Brief Window into the Past

This morning marked a very special occasion in my city. A time capsule from 1959 (The centennial celebration of my city) was finally opened. In it were the memories of a fun-loving small town. The photographs of smiling men dressed in truly old-fashioned garb with grins spread wide across their face filled my heart with a sort of longing. How wonderful it would be to live in a community like that--where 400 volunteers are easily wrangled to put on a pageant about the city's history. Just to live in a place where community is so strong, that would be a wonderful experience.
I was struck, though, by another aspect of this window into the past. A letter from one Mr. Carlson to his future family was read aloud. In it he discussed the necessity of going beyond what is in front of us, and taking that one step further to go beyond the beyond. We must go beyond ourselves to live in love and community with each other and we must go beyond our circumstances to build the world in which we live into a better place. He sought to impress upon his family the importance of enjoying the simply things in life: "fresh fruit", "a light breeze" and the like. But it was one of his final comments that really reached to my heart:
"We can not create. We can not destroy. We can only transform."
My sister and I had quite the debate on the veracity of this statement. She disagreed with it citing the atom bomb and our ability to clone. However, from a chemistry stance, matter is neither created nor destroyed. We can change the world, but what have we really changed? nothing but the order of the atoms. We merely transform their order and form. From my sister's point of view, this transformation has destroyed one thing and created another. In the end, we are both right. From a philosophical perspective, we will both still be right.

Mr. Carlson has given me quite a lot to ponder.