In and of itself, it was quite remarkable that it should bother thinking about things ephemeral.
It considered a number of things that were fleeting and short-lived. There were envelopes, leaflets, menus, newspapers, pamphlets, invitations, brochures, adverts, bank cheques, posters, stamps, theatre programs, bookmarks, ticket stubs, transport labels, box labels, luggage labels, lottery tickets, flyers and bumper stickers. Of course, there were cards. Yes, all sorts of cards. There were, postcards, birthday cards, greeting cards, bingo cards, library book cards; in fact, too many to mention. Although, it often thought about cards. It goes without saying, humans know nothing of this.
It could even imagine a text message caught in midair, between one phone and another. That was certainly a transient thing. Also, there was social media with its content that was temporary. Some of it only visible for a short time before it disappears, such as Tik Tok and Instagram. They were good examples of ephemeral content.
There was always ephemeral knowledge. All that information with an expiration date. Cases where the actual context in which it is useful is itself quite transitory. Naturally, there were some pieces of information, or even certain skills that are limited in their value by how applicable they were. With respect to skills only used briefly, it had often seen this as a waste.
Again, humans know nothing of this.
However, it, being a dainty mayfly with only a couple of days to live, and as such having the shortest lifespan of any known animal, it was probably best to continue its search for some small insect larvae to eat; that is, if it wanted to live a full life!
