A Walk Among the Tombstones

The Graveyard of Hopes and Dreams

Tom White

Aug 7, 2023

Perhaps millions of people, in the last few thousand years, have had ideas for improving it. All I did was take things a little further than just having the idea. —James Dyson
You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to desist from it. —Rabbi Tarfon
It isn’t evil that is ruining the earth, but mediocrity. The crime is not that Nero played while Rome burned, but that he played badly. —Ned Rorem

Above: Under each tombstone rests a person who would trade places with you in and for a heartbeat.

Graveyards often set the scene for thrillers and horror films.

Thick fog and inky darkness shroud and swallow a looming full moon.

Cracked, crooked tombstones mark victims of murder or madness.

A wolf’s howl or owl’s hoot punctuates a heavy silence.

All these and more portend mischief and malice.

It’s spooky, sure, but only in a superficial way.

Much more terrifying is another resting place: The Graveyard of Hopes and Dreams.

This necropolis is a special kind of hell—a nightmarish place where many things died before they were truly dead. Buried here are men and women who confused breathing with living; those for whom what could have been and what was lie miles apart.

Epitaphs of regret cover its many tombstones.

To read each one is to feel the stabbing, visceral pain of a life unlived, a potential unreached, a talent unexplored, a word unsaid:

He Could Have Married the Love of His Life.
She Could Have Forgiven Her Sister.
They Could Have Had Children.

Horrifically, these failures don’t come with a bang but a whimper. They are often the cumulative result of inertia: a litany of “Tomorrow” and “Later” and “Someday.”

If not by procrastination, then mediocrity; murdered by blows of “Good enough” and “Whatever.”

Regardless, all interred here share one thing: the rigor mortis of regret.

It is as stifling as it is cold, as suffocating as it is overpowering. To catch its whiff is to understand that the stench of regret is much more foul than that of embarrassment.

It is to comprehend that the great tragedy of life isn't when you draw your last breath, but when your hopes, dreams, and resources die within you while you are still alive.

Let this place be a warning to all those who enter.

Unused talent diminishes.

Unused potential decays.

Unused time dies.

Unused knowledge becomes a burden.

Quite simply, what isn't used is abused.

You don’t have to win the race but you had better run it.

The more you sweat in life, the more soundly you will rest on your deathbed.

Aim for the asymptote. Shrug against infinity.

You have this one life.

Use it before you inevitably lose it.

As Trotsky wrote, old age is the most unexpected of all things that happen to a man. It doesn’t bellow and barge in, it whispers and creeps.

I leave you with the wise words of Nobel Laureate Bob Dylan:

You're going to die. You're going to be dead. It could be 20 years, it could be tomorrow, anytime.
So am I. I mean, we're just going to be gone. The world's going to go on without us…
You do your job in the face of that, and how seriously you take yourself, you decide for yourself.

Do the things you know you must do.

They will always be there. You won’t.

Make sure your hopes and dreams don’t come to rest beside your body: six feet under.

Per my about page, White Noise is a work of experimentation. I view it as a sort of thinking aloud, a stress testing of my nascent ideas. Through it, I hope to sharpen my opinions against the whetstone of other people’s feedback, commentary, and input.

If you want to discuss any of the ideas or musings mentioned above or have any books, papers, or links that you think would be interesting to share on a future edition of White Noise, please reach out to me by replying to this email or following me on Twitter.

With sincere gratitude,

Tom