On the patio we have an open rectangle, a three sided affair of blocks that stack about hip high in a basic symmetrical design. Inside of that rectangle sits the grill, which we will use less and less as the nights turn colder. The grill is covered and, on especially windy days, I’ll sit a heavy wrought iron chair in front of it, and just on the edge of the cover, hoping to keep it in place.

The grill faces two tables, which always speak to the promise of gatherings and parties and loud and peaceful nights outside in the best of seasons. And beyond are peaceful views of the treelines, the neighbor’s roofs, and so on. On the other side of the grill is a vibrant mishmash of plants from all over. Not all of them are native, but everything seems to prosper here in the soil here, where the heavy land and the green sands meet.

I say that because, just beyond the treeline behind us, just atop this tiny little hill, those soil types come together, a clash and a marriage of ancient geological forces that seem frozen to our human conceptions of time, but are really just passing through and alongside one another over the course of the geological history of everything.

My agronomy professors would be pleased.

Unknown to all of that, and behind that grill, and atop those stones, is this little patch of moss.

I could clean that off. Maybe I should.

But the current thinking is that moss could have been a part of ancient ice ages, some 470 million years ago. It spread on land, the thinking goes, absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, dissolved, formed and altered rocks, which released significant amounts of phosphorus and iron which ended up in the oceans, where it caused massive algal blooms, taking more CO2 from the atmosphere. Then it is a chain of consequences. Small organisms feeding on the nutrients, leaving large areas without oxygen, which caused a mass extinction of marine species, meanwhile the levels of CO2 dropped all over the world, allowing the formation of ice caps on the poles and a few weeks later, we showed up, quoting Descartes and watching Friends.

Moss has long had medicinal purposes around here. The indigenous people at various times used it for bedding, diapers, and first aid, like wound dressing. That was still done through World War I because the stuff can just absorb moisture like someone reading Descartes for the first time. In other times in other parts of the world, it was once a foodstuff. It still has commercial uses. Why would you want to remove something as important as all that?

Someone, and I’m not naming names, picked up a supply of paper products made by people determined to upset the paper product paradigm.

What’s with this wavy perforation pattern?

It apparently started last year and has just now found its way to us. It is an attempt to solve the top problem consumers have … the incomplete tear.

We’ve really stumbled upon a moment in human society here.

If you thought I would go back to Descartes, well, you were right. But he takes us a different way.

I did say that there was some difficulty in expelling from our belief everything we have previously accepted. One reason for this is that before we can decide to doubt, we need some reason for doubting; and that is why in my First Meditation I put forward the principal reasons for doubt. (Replies 5, appendix, AT 9a:204, CSM 2:270)

He makes it clear that we should not extend hyperbolic doubt to practical matters:

I made a very careful distinction between the conduct of life and the contemplation of the truth. As far as the conduct of life is concerned, I am very far from thinking that we should assent only to what is clearly perceived. … from time to time we will have to choose one of many alternatives about which we have no knowledge … (Replies 2, AT 7:149, CSM 2:106)

The man was a 17th century genius philosopher and mathematician. If you try to look up his thoughts on toilet paper … you’ll be disappointed. He also couldn’t handle criticism, and suggested some of his contemporaries work would be best left to the privy.

Less messy than the moss, one supposes.