I think just about every single person ever is running this mental calculus all the time,

whether we know we're doing it or not. And I guess the term for this, you know, that transcends all

different religions and walks of life and persuasions about how things are. I think the term is

fate. Everyone's always thinking about fate, about how stuff

lines up, about how actions cause results, about counterfactuals. That sounds real fancy is the

term that smart philosophers, I guess, apparently used to talk about things that could have been,

but weren't. If this had just bounced a slightly different

way everybody's always adding that up because we think in terms of cause and effect and we think

in terms of what if there's a whole marvel series called what if where they just explore what

if this had bounced that way instead of that way or what if this had happened a moment later

than when it actually happened. Country musicians seemed to love

this theme in kind of a sentimental way. Garth Brooks, when I was a kid, had that. It's about to come to me.

Sometimes I thank God for unanswered prayers. It's the song that he's saying about. I prayed for these things to happen,

but that isn't what I really needed. And I'm glad that this other thing happened. Okay, you know,

that's cool. Is it Diamond Rio? I try not to think about what might have been. That's little

Texas, isn't it? I don't know. You'll tell me. You know who it is.

What might have been, though? I mean, that's thinking about fate. It's thinking about counterfactuals.

It's thinking about a time and space added up to make what is as compared to how it could have worked

out. My daughter loves this country musician named Jordan Davis. I don't like him at all. He's got a good

beard, but I don't like his haircut. It's all rich and luxuriant, but the beard is nice. And he has a

song called Almost Maybe's, and this is my Google Voice, because I don't remember the words to it exactly,

but I've heard it. So I'm pulling up the words. You have a Google voice, too. Don't judge. It's absent-minded. It's just a placeholder voice. Found it. Here we go. Almost-Mabies by Jordan Davis. This is the punchline that I want you to hear. Here's are the tears and beers and wasted years on the weeds that look like daisies. I wouldn't be sitting here next to you if it weren't for the almost maybes.

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