What’s left to accomplish at day's end? Or at the beginning? Some prefer the early morning hours to get things done. Others do nothing all day and then sleep well all night. If we have a chance to sleep and dream, we’re doing something, right? As if we should worry. It’s been said before that anxiety and stress are contemporary problems. I’m sure there were times when humans fretted over things out of their control. Say back in the dark ages, with the black plague, the red death, or marauding hordes randomly attacking villages, raping, and pillaging. It’s possible that somebody threw a bucket of piss out the second-story window down on a stranger’s head without the obligatory heads-up warning. It taxes our brains to simply think, with real issues like pandemics and nuclear annihilation. Obliteration rattles around in the empty heads of modern retrospective jumbled thoughts. It wasn’t so long ago that we had a major toilet paper shortage. Maybe you should sleep on it. Take two painkillers and call me in the morning.
Counting sheep never works. Pills are a temporary solution. The remnants of daily life become burdensome to people who haven’t lived, for the most part, in and of the moment. But the second you do, it’s already gone. The past, this moment, and some blurred future get lost in the mix of now. Drinking fish, smoking chimneys, flowing rivers, and sinking stones have one thing in common. I don’t know what that would be, or what’s going on.
It always comes down to being within earshot at the time you hear it. Or it never happened. I can’t definitively prove or deny anything. Do you need to know or care about the possibility that a mega-continent formation in 225 million years will have any effect on your life now or on our species later? The fact that the James Webb Telescope spotted thousands of wannabe Milky Way lookalikes wandering through the galaxies. There’s no way India’s moon rover landed anywhere close to the South Pole of the lunar surface. Even finding recently discovered ruins and evidence by expert archaeologists of an entirely new ancient language changes absolutely nothing. The cuneiform glyphs depicted some kind of ritual or spiritual understanding. No one knows exactly what or why, for certain. It’s all drivel. So why all the fuss?
It’s a new sort of truth in advertising for the history of civilization as a commodity for consumers to buy or reject. My youthful exuberance is waning. I no longer tolerate the buying and selling of my soul. There’s no need to put up with the bullshit that barely passes for reality. I’ve nothing to prove, and I don’t seek any approval. I did my time. Not only that, but I served the sentence handed down to me by the court of public opinion. Ups, downs, and everything in between are of no consequence for playing the rigged game. The lifetime hoax award. A professional fraud. We’re all around here, Bub; it’s no contest from now on. I plead nolo contendere. There are no contenders for the throne. The recognition goes beyond identity theft, the rapture, or useless politics. I no longer desire your blessings. What’s going on in my mind is the only true barometer of what memories allow. I think, therefore I drink. Or it’s just me driving myself to happy hour with a flat tire. I think of you often Whoever you are. Do I know you? Perhaps you’re an invention of my overactive imagination. Look, we’ve been through all this before, and just like always, nothing gets resolved!
I’m old-fashioned. I like my cocktails double-sided. It’s always nice when you come around. It seems like yesterday. Yet, it was a lifetime ago. How is this possible? I just saw you not long ago. I’m seeing double. When you least expect it, sometimes it’s over and done—just finished. A fitting end to a stale career. There’s a media blackout in effect. The news that’s leaked out isn’t promising. It doesn’t sound too good. You’re not looking very good yourself. Is there something wrong or anything I can do? Anything. If they can’t get by on their own steam, then take them out behind the house and put them out of their misery. Unplug life support. Your air supply is dwindling. The moment you realize it’s gone, it is. That’s when I reach for my machine gun. That’s when I blow it all away.