The 15 Craigside Photo Club meets the first Sunday of the month. The originators are Irene, who lives on my floor in this seniors community, and Scott Kubo from the Honolulu Museum of Art, our mentor. Here is a photo of the two. We are asked by Scott to submit a few photos on a theme he selects for show and tell at our gathering. This month it had something to do with being thankful. Of course, family, friends and health are at the top of the list. At least, Google AI indicated that to me, and I agree. Most members here will no doubt submit these kinds of photos. Or something to do with religion.However, when I thought about this earlier in the month, I couldn't come up with interesting enough photos to take or from my photo file. So I picked rainbows and sunsets, because those photos had a lot of color. I then narrowed my choice down to only sunsets.
I was born in 1940, the most important year ever for me, for I was born. Why? Because my very existence is a 1 in 400 trillion bit of luck.
Why that number? Came from Google AI. So I further asked: why?
The "one in 400 trillion" chance is a popular, but unscientific, figure
used to highlight the statistical unlikelihood of any one person's existence. It is a calculation that multiplies the odds of a specific sperm fertilizing a specific egg, combined with the astronomical odds of all the preceding ancestors, events, and circumstances leading up to that conception. 
The second most important year of my life will be when I pass away.
- That is a 100% probability.
- Many of you will go to heaven or hell, but my belief about my ultimate termination is that it will be black gloom forever....or eternal peace. I'm trying to lean towards the latter.
- Then, there are others who will be praying for me to make it to Heaven, so I can also hope that they will succeed.
The Catholic religion has a decision point called Purgatory.- When I first moved into 15 Craigside, I only then noticed that I was surrounded by churches.
- My lifestyle here was secure and comfortable.
- So for fun I wondered if this could actually be Purgatory. Read that posting.
- Two years ago I revisited this notion.
So about my third most important year, I think it was 1962. That was momentous.
- January: Cuba and the Soviet Union sign a trade pact.
- February: U.S embargo against Cuba is announced.
February: During a new moon and solar eclipse, there is a grand conjunction of the five classical planets, plus the Sun and Moon.- March: A military flight with 107 on board headed for Vietnam vanishes. No wreckage or bodies are ever found.
April: Jawaharlal Nehru is elected Prime Minister of India, for the fourth time.- April: West Side Story wins Best Picture. My girlfriend at Stanford arranges to get us to San Francisco back to campus, pays for dinner and treats me for the West Coast premiere of this film.
- May: Project Mercury--Scott Carpenter orbits Earth 3 times.
- June: I graduate from Stanford University and, on my way home to Honolulu, I stop by Seattle for the World's Fair. My first. Made many more of these Expo trips, with latest being this year in Osaka.
June: Rachel Carson publishes Silent Spring.- June: I begin my first full-time job at the Hutchison Sugar Company on the Big Island of Hawaii as a sugar factory engineer.
July: Bought my first car, a Triumph TR-3, probably the best I ever owned.- August: Jamaica gains independence from the UK and is the first to begin to form the Commonwealth of Nations. (Considering the severity of Hurricane Melissa, latest reports indicate "only" 28 deaths.)
- September: John F. Kennedy gives his We choose to go the Moon speech.
- September: Manager of Hutchinson Sugar Company, Bill Baldwin, introduces me to Pearl.
- October: Cuban missile crisis.
- November: First personal computer.
- December: I marry Pearl.
In the totality of world events, my existence, of course, is infinitesimal. To close, those sunset photos I will show at the 15C photo club session today.
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