The North Pole

Odd . . . you can travel north until you bump your nose on the North Pole. You can do the same with the South Pole. Our planet has a definite top and bottom, marked by barber poles (if you look at cartoons) or 55-gallon drums (if you look at photos).

But there is no East Pole or West Pole. You can go so far North than you are now going South; ditto the opposite. Yet, you cannot go so far East that you are now heading West, nor West to East. You can keep going East until the cows come home, taxes are lowered, or the Second Coming happens. If you want to go West for the rest of your life, that option is open to you, as well.

“Unfair!” say the representatives from East and West. “We want a terminus same as North and South. If one can turn into the other in a footstep, we want to learn the quick-change act, too.”

“Ah,” say Mother and Father Nature, “but you have different roles. N & S are death and rebirth; you get to that mythical barber pole and your journey ends, but suddenly it begins anew in another direction and life goes on.

“E & W are eternity and never end. Not only that, but they exist together and their travelers can go forever in both directions and never run into a border. Time and eternity are forever symbolically intertwined on this planet.”