There is no guarantee of happiness, wisdom, or long life if you drink of me this evening, she says, very softly. There is no nirvana. There is no sal… - Dan Simmons

I thought—To lose all this forever?
And I hallucinated Aenea’s voice saying To lose all this forever is the essence of being human, my love.

Almost everything interesting in the human experience is the result of an individual experiencing, experimenting, explaining, and sharing, said my young friend. A hive mind would be the ancient television broadcasts, or life at the height of the datasphere...consensual idiocy.

I could not do this, I realized, if I were immortal. This degree of love of life and of one another is granted, I saw for once and for ever, not to immortals, but to those who live briefly and always under the shadow of death and loss.