| The End of All Things |
| ================================= The day everything became nothing, I was standing underneath a streetlight, wishing I had a cigarette. I can't recall anything unusual about it. If there was something in the air, if the skies had clouded over, I wasn't aware, I was too bored to care. No thunder roared. No lightning cracked. No missiles rained from the sky. This was no sneak attack. There was just suddenly this awful lack. Things had changed, that's for sure. The day everything became nothing, you couldn't put your finger on what had gone wrong. The alleys were still dirty; the garbage still smelled; there was no panic in the streets; just a lot of grief--in people's faces, in their eyes--a mixture of horror and total surprise. This was no apocalypse. No one heard a voice from the sky, there were no miracles at the 7-Eleven, no one screamed, no one even asked why. It was just like everything had somehow, quietly died. So let it die! I can't recall much of what happened next. I was on my way to visit this woman I knew. All we had in common was good sex, and now I couldn't even remember her address. A group of us, just strangers, got together and we formed a committee to discuss the problem. We talked about things like assured mutual destruction and emotional responsibility. I couldn't remember my name, so I called myself Bob. It's weird being a Bob, but I'll get used to it. I have to. |