Exhalation

by Ted Chiang

“Four things do not come back: the spoken word, the sped arrow, the past life, and the neglected opportunity,”

“Coincidence and intention are two sides of a tapestry, my lord. You may find one more agreeable to look at, but you cannot say one is true and the other is false.”

Nothing erases the past. There is repentance, there is atonement, and there is forgiveness. That is all, but that is enough.

In 1978, the physicist Michael Berry calculated that you could predict only nine collisions before you would need to account for the gravitational effect of a person standing in the room.

If the same thing happens in branches where you acted differently, then you aren’t the cause.

Sex isn’t what makes a relationship real; the willingness to expend effort maintaining it is. Some lovers break up with each other the first time they have a big argument; some parents do as little for their children as they can get away with; some pet owners ignore their pets whenever they become inconvenient. In all of those cases, the people are unwilling to make an effort. Having a real relationship, whether with a lover or a child or a pet, requires that you be willing to balance the other party’s wants and needs with your own.