If you follow my blog, you know that I usually write essays – creative non-fiction stories inspired by actual events. “What It’s Like” is a new experiment for me.
What follows is one of my first attempts at writing fiction. Because blogs are short by definition, I’ve broken this story into 6 small parts. This is Part 1…
What It’s Like
The Earth took his training wheels off only a short few billion years ago. Before then, he followed the other planets through their frenzied orbits, barely keeping out from under their feet. He wasn't the typical middle child, quiet and demure. The Earth was curious and inquisitive, constantly asking questions like:
Why do I have to wear sunscreen?
What if I don't want to eat my vegetables?
and
Are we there yet?
Despite the endless questions, the other planets liked the Earth. He was innocent and green. He seldom whined or complained about his cold, wet bottom. Plus, he never made fun of Uranus... and that was hard to do.
There were a few years during puberty, when his face erupted in a volcanic mess, that the Earth was unbearable. But that was all behind him now. The Earth had learned to accept that as you grow older, things change. Everything shifts. Pangaea gives way to urban expansion. And no matter how hard you diet and exercise, your doctor is going to continually nag that your rising sea levels "might be cause for concern."
Mid-life was comfortable for the Earth. Covered with a shadow of rain-forest whiskers, he looked rugged and distinguished. He had established a routine, but predictability made the Earth restless. He worried his life was going around in circles, never really getting anywhere. Parts of him felt like the days went on forever and the night would never end, like there was nothing new under the sun.
Then, two days after giving Asia an extraordinary sunset, the Earth heard some unsettling news. He wasn't eavesdropping, of course, but it's hard to ignore a billion voices whispering in your ear. That's why he loved text messages and Twitter. They did wonders for his migraines.
But since terror really is expressed best through the spoken word, the news that a meteor was headed toward Earth was bigger than text messages could accommodate. As soon as the meteor was sighted, television reporters across the world began talking about "the catastrophic event," "our pending extinction," and "the violent end of life as we know it."
And the Earth was listening.
The Earth noticed long ago that the people were always panicking about something. Fortunately, their hysteria seldom lasted long. Before he turned around twice, the drama usually died down. Most of their problems ended as little more than forgotten headlines in a landfill.
The news that a meteor was headed toward the Earth, however, rocked the Earth to his core. The dinosaurs hadn't done a very good job of warning him about the last meteor, a surprise from the black that hit him like a cosmic car accident. One day he just turned around, saw it swerve into his orbit, and thought, "shit, this is going to hurt." And it did. Bad.
And now, according to the people, another meteor was on its way. "Whoever's out there throwing rocks needs to stop," he thought. "I'm too old for this."
Unfortunately, the coming meteor wasn't just a rock, a hardened teenager who had run away from home with plans of crashing on another planet's couch. It was bigger. Much bigger. It was so big that the popular media was at a loss for how to report its true size. Most people had seen enough disaster movies that they were desensitized to phrases like "rock the size of Texas."
In truth, the meteor had quite a bit in common with Texas, an ambitious - and egotistic - American state who dreamed of breaking free to become its own country. But the meteor, a rock several times the size of Earth, had done what Texas never would. It had succeeded in breaking free from its own solar system and had achieved geologic independence. Practically its own planet, the meteor went wherever it wanted, unencumbered by curfews and gravity. And since the its equator was wider than everyone else's, most planets knew not to get in its way.
The idea of a bully pushing its way through the cosmos was understandably stressful for the Earth. He didn’t like conflict. He didn’t enjoy being pushed around and bumped into. He was already self-conscious about his receding rainforests. The last thing he wanted was a new unsightly crater on his southern hemisphere.
Unfortunately, the Earth worrying about a new crater before being hit by the meteor was like a child worrying about a loose tooth before being hit by a train. The meteor wasn’t going to dent the Earth, it was going to destroy the Earth.
Within a few weeks, the meteor would become visible as a small speck in the Milky Way. The speck would grow as the meteor approached, slowing filling the night sky. First the North Star would disappear. Then the big dipper would loose its handle. Within a few months, Orion, Scorpio, and all their twinkling friends would be hidden from view, eclipsed by the meteor’s huge girth.
Several weeks before the big event, when the meteor was finally close enough, its gravity would pull the Earth’s oceans from their beds, gathering them together until they looked like a giant raindrop falling up into the sky.
Then, at the moment of impact, the Earth would shatter like a snowball, barely feeling a thing.
To Be Continued...
To read part 2, click here.
Sunday, October 18, 2009
What It's Like (part 2)
This is part 2 of a short story cut into shorter sections. To see part 1 and follow the entire story, click here.
“It’s just obnoxious the way these meteors think of no one but themselves,” the Earth ranted. “They go wherever they want and do whatever they want with no thought of who they’re inconveniencing or what they’re destroying. It’s not as if the stupid meteor doesn’t know where I’m going to be 253 days, 3 hours, and 14 minutes from now.”
The Earth had a good point. His schedule was as regular as clockwork. In fact, his schedule was the basis for clockwork. Everyone always knew where the Earth was going to be years before he got there. That’s the beauty – and monotony – of orbit. It leaves little room for variation.
If the meteor knew where he was going to be and when he was going to be there, then why, the Earth wondered, did it insist on disrupting his schedule?
The answer, of course, was that the meteor was terribly inflexible. Concepts like “yield,” “stop,” and “turn” implied compromises that the meteor, a selfishly single-minded rock, saw as signs of weakness.
While the Earth didn’t appreciate the meteor’s bullish arrogance, he secretly envied its freedom. Unlike the Earth’s constantly curved path, the meteor’s straight line seemed exotic and unpredictable. Its past and future never met. The meteor never saw the same thing twice. It had direction, but no plan. It never knew what it would encounter or who it would run into in the swirling void.
The Earth felt like he was in such a rut. Every day was a circle that started at dawn, curved through noon and midnight, and eventually led back to another sunrise. The years passed with the same summer always coming after the same spring. He wondered what it would feel like to live un-tethered to the daily demands of orbit. He enjoyed his circle around the Sun, but how many times could he smile and make small talk with Venus as they passed? Sure, she was attractive. Saturn was dying to get his rings around her. Even Pluto, a shy planet with an eternal identity crisis, wanted to talk to her. But for all her charms, Venus wasn’t much of a conversationalist. The Earth needed more.
To Be Continued...
To read part 3, click here.
“It’s just obnoxious the way these meteors think of no one but themselves,” the Earth ranted. “They go wherever they want and do whatever they want with no thought of who they’re inconveniencing or what they’re destroying. It’s not as if the stupid meteor doesn’t know where I’m going to be 253 days, 3 hours, and 14 minutes from now.”
The Earth had a good point. His schedule was as regular as clockwork. In fact, his schedule was the basis for clockwork. Everyone always knew where the Earth was going to be years before he got there. That’s the beauty – and monotony – of orbit. It leaves little room for variation.
If the meteor knew where he was going to be and when he was going to be there, then why, the Earth wondered, did it insist on disrupting his schedule?
The answer, of course, was that the meteor was terribly inflexible. Concepts like “yield,” “stop,” and “turn” implied compromises that the meteor, a selfishly single-minded rock, saw as signs of weakness.
While the Earth didn’t appreciate the meteor’s bullish arrogance, he secretly envied its freedom. Unlike the Earth’s constantly curved path, the meteor’s straight line seemed exotic and unpredictable. Its past and future never met. The meteor never saw the same thing twice. It had direction, but no plan. It never knew what it would encounter or who it would run into in the swirling void.
The Earth felt like he was in such a rut. Every day was a circle that started at dawn, curved through noon and midnight, and eventually led back to another sunrise. The years passed with the same summer always coming after the same spring. He wondered what it would feel like to live un-tethered to the daily demands of orbit. He enjoyed his circle around the Sun, but how many times could he smile and make small talk with Venus as they passed? Sure, she was attractive. Saturn was dying to get his rings around her. Even Pluto, a shy planet with an eternal identity crisis, wanted to talk to her. But for all her charms, Venus wasn’t much of a conversationalist. The Earth needed more.
To Be Continued...
To read part 3, click here.
What It's Like (part 3)
This is part 3 of a short story cut into shorter sections. To see part 1 and follow the entire story, click here.
The Earth wondered how the people would deal with the approaching meteor. He suspected they would recycle one of their Hollywood clichés and shoot a missile at it. The people, of course, had the same idea. Within hours of the meteor’s discovery, a swarm of satellites started buzzing around the Earth like gnats on a spring day. China talked to England. Canada made a conference call to Turkey. NASA turned its telescopes to the heavens and told everyone the end was near unless they acted fast.
The people acted fast. Their leaders started pressing buttons and unlocking doors, uncovering weapons hidden long ago like eggs in the Easter grass.
“If we can split an atom,” the people thought, “surely we can split a meteor.”
But given the choice between fight and flight, the Earth wasn't sure picking a fight with the meteor was the best idea. "Flight," he thought, "might be a better option."
Afraid for his own future, the Earth began to formulate a plan.
For years the Earth had walked lazily around the sun, turning the corners gently to keep the people from losing their balance. But what if he sped up a bit?
"If I start running now," he thought, "I can just get out of the stupid meteor’s way. I could be halfway across the solar system by the time it arrives. If I’m 186 million miles ahead of schedule, hiding safely on the other side of the universe, I won’t even have to brush shoulders with it when it passes!”
The Earth knew that speeding up would require everyone – including himself – to adapt to a new schedule. The change would be hard for the people. Traditionally, even slow changes that obviously needed to happen (like evolution and equality) had been difficult for them.
Adjusting to a new way of life wouldn’t be easy for him, either. But what choice did he have? The facts of his existence were conspiring against him. He couldn’t continue on his current course and still survive.
And so, before the people could launch their missiles at the sky, the Earth took a deep breath and started to speed up. Faster and faster he ran. The faster he ran, the faster the days flew by. They passed with quickening speed until a single week was little more than a blur of sunrises and sunsets.
The roosters were the first to realize that the days were passing more quickly. Their cock-a-doodle-doos were hardly done before the sun was high in the mid-day sky. The people felt it, too. They noticed that the evening news was barely over before the morning show began. An alarm clock company even went out of business when its customers complained their clocks wouldn’t stay set. What the disgruntled clock holders didn’t realize was that their clocks worked perfectly, ticking away sixty seconds every minute of a 24 hour day. It was the days, hurried by the Earth’s new schedule, that were wrong.
The Earth didn’t care. It felt good to take control of his own future.
He sped straight through summer and practically skipped fall. The long trip that usually took a lazy year to complete was done in a matter of weeks. Birds, confused by the strobing sunsets, flew south for the winter only to find their homes under four feet of snow. Children were equally surprised when spring break started three days before Christmas.
The children loved the new schedule. They had hardly finished one birthday before the next one began. Girls celebrated their sweet sixteen with Barbie Doll cakes and Dora the Explorer parties. Boys were old enough to buy beer before their voices changed.
The rapid succession of birthdays made parents worry that their babies were growing up too fast. Their concern, however, wasn’t only for their children. A woman in Iowa had just graduated from college, gotten married, and was expecting the birth of her first child when she became eligible for a senior-citizen movie discount. Millions of women like her were equally unprepared to grow old gracefully.
Anxiety levels also rose among college students who complained they didn’t have enough time to study for exams. Pulling an all-nighter was practically pointless. The sun came up before they could finish a second cup of coffee. And when fraternity boys partied all night on Friday with plans of sleeping late on Saturday, it was sometimes Monday morning before they woke up and wondered where the weekend had gone – which wasn’t very different from the way things had always been.
College students weren’t the only ones with hurried schedules. A chapter of PA (Procrastinators Anonymous) contemplated disbanding when its members complained they could no longer find time in their newly-busy schedules for the monthly meetings. The president put off making a decision until more members could be present for a vote.
Even Santa’s elves were disgruntled. Unable to keep up with their new production schedule, the doll division threatened to strike.
The future was simply coming before the people were prepared for it. Before the Earth began his sprint toward safety, both the quick and the careful could order their lives because they knew what words like “next week,” “next month,” and “next year” meant. Like “one pound” and “four meters,” the meanings of “one minute” and “four days” were constant. This predictability not only helped sell thousands of calendars at Christmas, it also gave the people an illusion of control.
But now “tomorrow” was like a menstrual cycle -- reliable, but unpredictable. The people always knew it was coming, but they didn’t know exactly when it would get there or how long it would stay.
Across the globe, petitions were signed asking the Earth to slow down. Concerned citizens gathered at community centers and organized anti-Earth demonstrations. Unlike the great protests of the past, however, the people marched without knowing where to go. Since City Hall couldn’t solve their problem, the people wandered aimlessly, hoping the Earth would hear them yell.
At a march in Oregon, an environmentalist who had once fought to save the rainforests led a group in chanting “stop the world, I wanna get off!” At a rally in Atlanta, a construction worker carried a shovel, but he never followed through with his threats to dig a hole.
It didn’t take long, however, before the people realized that there wasn’t anything anybody could do to make the Earth slow down.
Activists couldn’t boycott anyone.
Armies couldn’t attack anyone.
Police couldn’t arrest anyone.
Lawyers couldn’t sue anyone.
Men couldn’t threaten anyone.
Women couldn’t manipulate anyone.
The AARP, whose membership had recently doubled, printed an informative pamphlet, but nobody had time to read it.
In the chaos, confusion, and frustration, the meteor was temporarily forgotten.
To Be Continued...
To read part 4, click here.
The Earth wondered how the people would deal with the approaching meteor. He suspected they would recycle one of their Hollywood clichés and shoot a missile at it. The people, of course, had the same idea. Within hours of the meteor’s discovery, a swarm of satellites started buzzing around the Earth like gnats on a spring day. China talked to England. Canada made a conference call to Turkey. NASA turned its telescopes to the heavens and told everyone the end was near unless they acted fast.
The people acted fast. Their leaders started pressing buttons and unlocking doors, uncovering weapons hidden long ago like eggs in the Easter grass.
“If we can split an atom,” the people thought, “surely we can split a meteor.”
But given the choice between fight and flight, the Earth wasn't sure picking a fight with the meteor was the best idea. "Flight," he thought, "might be a better option."
Afraid for his own future, the Earth began to formulate a plan.
For years the Earth had walked lazily around the sun, turning the corners gently to keep the people from losing their balance. But what if he sped up a bit?
"If I start running now," he thought, "I can just get out of the stupid meteor’s way. I could be halfway across the solar system by the time it arrives. If I’m 186 million miles ahead of schedule, hiding safely on the other side of the universe, I won’t even have to brush shoulders with it when it passes!”
The Earth knew that speeding up would require everyone – including himself – to adapt to a new schedule. The change would be hard for the people. Traditionally, even slow changes that obviously needed to happen (like evolution and equality) had been difficult for them.
Adjusting to a new way of life wouldn’t be easy for him, either. But what choice did he have? The facts of his existence were conspiring against him. He couldn’t continue on his current course and still survive.
And so, before the people could launch their missiles at the sky, the Earth took a deep breath and started to speed up. Faster and faster he ran. The faster he ran, the faster the days flew by. They passed with quickening speed until a single week was little more than a blur of sunrises and sunsets.
The roosters were the first to realize that the days were passing more quickly. Their cock-a-doodle-doos were hardly done before the sun was high in the mid-day sky. The people felt it, too. They noticed that the evening news was barely over before the morning show began. An alarm clock company even went out of business when its customers complained their clocks wouldn’t stay set. What the disgruntled clock holders didn’t realize was that their clocks worked perfectly, ticking away sixty seconds every minute of a 24 hour day. It was the days, hurried by the Earth’s new schedule, that were wrong.
The Earth didn’t care. It felt good to take control of his own future.
He sped straight through summer and practically skipped fall. The long trip that usually took a lazy year to complete was done in a matter of weeks. Birds, confused by the strobing sunsets, flew south for the winter only to find their homes under four feet of snow. Children were equally surprised when spring break started three days before Christmas.
The children loved the new schedule. They had hardly finished one birthday before the next one began. Girls celebrated their sweet sixteen with Barbie Doll cakes and Dora the Explorer parties. Boys were old enough to buy beer before their voices changed.
The rapid succession of birthdays made parents worry that their babies were growing up too fast. Their concern, however, wasn’t only for their children. A woman in Iowa had just graduated from college, gotten married, and was expecting the birth of her first child when she became eligible for a senior-citizen movie discount. Millions of women like her were equally unprepared to grow old gracefully.
Anxiety levels also rose among college students who complained they didn’t have enough time to study for exams. Pulling an all-nighter was practically pointless. The sun came up before they could finish a second cup of coffee. And when fraternity boys partied all night on Friday with plans of sleeping late on Saturday, it was sometimes Monday morning before they woke up and wondered where the weekend had gone – which wasn’t very different from the way things had always been.
College students weren’t the only ones with hurried schedules. A chapter of PA (Procrastinators Anonymous) contemplated disbanding when its members complained they could no longer find time in their newly-busy schedules for the monthly meetings. The president put off making a decision until more members could be present for a vote.
Even Santa’s elves were disgruntled. Unable to keep up with their new production schedule, the doll division threatened to strike.
The future was simply coming before the people were prepared for it. Before the Earth began his sprint toward safety, both the quick and the careful could order their lives because they knew what words like “next week,” “next month,” and “next year” meant. Like “one pound” and “four meters,” the meanings of “one minute” and “four days” were constant. This predictability not only helped sell thousands of calendars at Christmas, it also gave the people an illusion of control.
But now “tomorrow” was like a menstrual cycle -- reliable, but unpredictable. The people always knew it was coming, but they didn’t know exactly when it would get there or how long it would stay.
Across the globe, petitions were signed asking the Earth to slow down. Concerned citizens gathered at community centers and organized anti-Earth demonstrations. Unlike the great protests of the past, however, the people marched without knowing where to go. Since City Hall couldn’t solve their problem, the people wandered aimlessly, hoping the Earth would hear them yell.
At a march in Oregon, an environmentalist who had once fought to save the rainforests led a group in chanting “stop the world, I wanna get off!” At a rally in Atlanta, a construction worker carried a shovel, but he never followed through with his threats to dig a hole.
It didn’t take long, however, before the people realized that there wasn’t anything anybody could do to make the Earth slow down.
Activists couldn’t boycott anyone.
Armies couldn’t attack anyone.
Police couldn’t arrest anyone.
Lawyers couldn’t sue anyone.
Men couldn’t threaten anyone.
Women couldn’t manipulate anyone.
The AARP, whose membership had recently doubled, printed an informative pamphlet, but nobody had time to read it.
In the chaos, confusion, and frustration, the meteor was temporarily forgotten.
To Be Continued...
To read part 4, click here.
What It's Like (part 4)
This is part 4 of a short story cut into shorter sections. To see part 1 and follow the entire story, click here.
The Earth felt it first in his North America. It then spread to his Europe and across his Asia. This wasn’t one of those headaches he got from too much pressure along his tectonic plates. This one was the direct result of 6 billion feet marching across his surface in angry unison. If they didn’t stop stomping soon, he would be forced to knock the people off balance. The Earth hadn’t been this upset since the invention of high-heeled shoes.
During what he considered the puberty of their race (generally referred to as “modernity”), the Earth felt the people had become disturbingly self-centered. Maybe he had a heart of stone, but the Earth was tired of being taken for granted. He was tired of letting ungrateful people walk all over him.
Wasn’t he always patient with them during their Thanksgiving Day Parade? Didn’t he suffer quietly through their New York City Marathon? He even allowed their military to practice their ridiculous advances and retreats at all hours of the day and night. His patience, however, was growing as thin as his ozone. The endless protest marches had to stop. They were not only irritating, they were insulting.
The Earth wasn’t deaf. He knew what everyone was saying about him. He heard it when the geologist from Caltech questioned his stability and told a reporter he thought the Earth might be cracking up. He was listening when Greenpeace voted to take his name off their website. He noticed when Earth Day was cancelled and replaced with a symbolically violent tether-ball tournament.
The Earth tried to ignore preachers when they filled their Sunday Sermons with stories comparing him to somebody named “The Prodigal Son,” but he couldn’t. From pulpits across the globe they shouted that he was like an arrogant child who ran away from his father and leapt carelessly into the future. They said he “neglected his responsibility” and “denied his true calling.” They condemned him for “choosing a path other than the one that had been assigned to him” and urged him to return to “the natural state of things.” They didn’t think the Earth realized how serious things had become.
The Earth was offended that the same people who invented oil-powered engines and artificial sweeteners dared to lecture him about “respecting creation” and “acting according to the laws of nature.”
Why, the Earth wondered, didn’t the people didn’t understand that he hadn’t broken away from his pre-determined path? He was still following the same circle around the same sun. He was simply doing it differently than he had been before. And even if he had rushed into the future, he hadn’t done it carelessly. He had done it from necessity.
Self preservation and selfishness are two entirely different things.
To Be Continued...
To read part 5, click here.
The Earth felt it first in his North America. It then spread to his Europe and across his Asia. This wasn’t one of those headaches he got from too much pressure along his tectonic plates. This one was the direct result of 6 billion feet marching across his surface in angry unison. If they didn’t stop stomping soon, he would be forced to knock the people off balance. The Earth hadn’t been this upset since the invention of high-heeled shoes.
During what he considered the puberty of their race (generally referred to as “modernity”), the Earth felt the people had become disturbingly self-centered. Maybe he had a heart of stone, but the Earth was tired of being taken for granted. He was tired of letting ungrateful people walk all over him.
Wasn’t he always patient with them during their Thanksgiving Day Parade? Didn’t he suffer quietly through their New York City Marathon? He even allowed their military to practice their ridiculous advances and retreats at all hours of the day and night. His patience, however, was growing as thin as his ozone. The endless protest marches had to stop. They were not only irritating, they were insulting.
The Earth wasn’t deaf. He knew what everyone was saying about him. He heard it when the geologist from Caltech questioned his stability and told a reporter he thought the Earth might be cracking up. He was listening when Greenpeace voted to take his name off their website. He noticed when Earth Day was cancelled and replaced with a symbolically violent tether-ball tournament.
The Earth tried to ignore preachers when they filled their Sunday Sermons with stories comparing him to somebody named “The Prodigal Son,” but he couldn’t. From pulpits across the globe they shouted that he was like an arrogant child who ran away from his father and leapt carelessly into the future. They said he “neglected his responsibility” and “denied his true calling.” They condemned him for “choosing a path other than the one that had been assigned to him” and urged him to return to “the natural state of things.” They didn’t think the Earth realized how serious things had become.
The Earth was offended that the same people who invented oil-powered engines and artificial sweeteners dared to lecture him about “respecting creation” and “acting according to the laws of nature.”
Why, the Earth wondered, didn’t the people didn’t understand that he hadn’t broken away from his pre-determined path? He was still following the same circle around the same sun. He was simply doing it differently than he had been before. And even if he had rushed into the future, he hadn’t done it carelessly. He had done it from necessity.
Self preservation and selfishness are two entirely different things.
To Be Continued...
To read part 5, click here.
What It's Like (part 5)
This is part 5 of a short story cut into shorter sections. To see part 1 and follow the entire story, click here.
Right in the middle of the evening news, the people looked up and saw it. It seemed like years since anyone had mentioned the meteor, but in reality it had only been a few months.
Fist the North Star Disappeared.
Then the Big Dipper lost its handle.
When a shadow fell across the sun, the people began to panic.
Some of them ran deep into underground cellars. Others herded themselves into churches to pray. A few important people remembered the missiles they’d left carelessly pointing toward the sky and met to decide what they should do.
Just as these important people prepared to push important buttons and send the missiles streaking into space (with little or no effect on the outrageous rock), a physicist scribbled something on her chalkboard. Out of the lines and numbers rose a wisp of chalky hope.
“But how is that possible,” the important people asked. “We already calculated that if the Earth is orbiting the sun at 29.77 km/s and the meteor is traveling in a straight line at 56.2 km/s, then we should collide with it… 7 months ago?”
The director of the CIA stormed into the room, brushing the first flakes of a light summer snow off his jacket.
“So, you’re saying what?”
“The meteor,” the physicist said, “is apparently going to miss the Earth by 186 million miles.”
“Well,” he stammered. “I’ll be damned.”
To Be Continued...
To read part 6, click here.
Right in the middle of the evening news, the people looked up and saw it. It seemed like years since anyone had mentioned the meteor, but in reality it had only been a few months.
Fist the North Star Disappeared.
Then the Big Dipper lost its handle.
When a shadow fell across the sun, the people began to panic.
Some of them ran deep into underground cellars. Others herded themselves into churches to pray. A few important people remembered the missiles they’d left carelessly pointing toward the sky and met to decide what they should do.
Just as these important people prepared to push important buttons and send the missiles streaking into space (with little or no effect on the outrageous rock), a physicist scribbled something on her chalkboard. Out of the lines and numbers rose a wisp of chalky hope.
“But how is that possible,” the important people asked. “We already calculated that if the Earth is orbiting the sun at 29.77 km/s and the meteor is traveling in a straight line at 56.2 km/s, then we should collide with it… 7 months ago?”
The director of the CIA stormed into the room, brushing the first flakes of a light summer snow off his jacket.
“So, you’re saying what?”
“The meteor,” the physicist said, “is apparently going to miss the Earth by 186 million miles.”
“Well,” he stammered. “I’ll be damned.”
To Be Continued...
To read part 6, click here.
What It's Like (part 6)
This is part 6 of a short story cut into shorter sections. To see part 1 and follow the entire story, click here.
At first the meteor’s pull on the Earth was as indefinable as emotion – little more than an idea tugging at his corners. Like happiness, fear, and excitement, it could be felt more than it could be explained.
As the meteor came closer, however, its gravity grew into something more concrete. The Earth’s oceans noticed it first. Suddenly disinterested with the moon, they found themselves attracted to the meteor, drawn to its rugged strength. Like crazed fans, they crowded the beaches and fought for the best view of its approach.
The Earth lit his northern lights to warn the meteor that it might be coming too close. Unfortunately, the stubborn forces of nature often ignore even the most heartfelt wishes and requests. The Earth didn’t know what to do. He had already done everything he could to control his future, and was worn out with the effort.
Until now, his path had been familiar and frictionless. Every day he moved through space carried by his own momentum, hardly working to spin through the seasons. In the vacuum, there was little need for effort or exertion. Nothing worked against him. Trusting his instincts and inertia, the Earth had taken for granted that he would always coast easily through life.
But now his forward motion was being interrupted by a sideways force. For the first time since he settled into the routine of orbit, The Earth felt resistance… friction… gravity pulling him in a direction other than the one he had always known.
As the meteor came closer, its gravity increased. Like a ball fighting to roll uphill, The Earth strained against its pull. When he tried to move forward, the meteor tugged him back. It didn’t matter how tightly he tried to hold to his orbit. The Earth was a movable object fighting an unstoppable force.
Finally, after weeks (or was it months? or years?) of straining against the meteor’s gravity, the Earth finally accepted what he could not change. He stopped fighting the invisible truth. Exhausted, he stopped running. For the first time since the meteor was sighted, the Earth relaxed and let nature take its course.
And as the meteor passed by – only 186 million miles away – its gravity wrapped around the Earth’s middle and slowly pulled him away from the sun and into the deep, dark unknown. The predictable curve of the his orbit was straightened into an infinite line. Like a hound chasing its quarry, the Earth left his home and followed the meteor into in the unknown of space.
When the meteor was first sighted, the Earth tried to save himself. He chose to run – to avoid the meteor rather than let it collide with him – and his plan worked. He hadn’t been destroyed by an impact. But despite his effort (or perhaps because of it), his path had been forever changed. Now, as the Earth followed the meteor past stars he had never seen, he wondered which was better, change or annihilation? He didn’t yet know.
He noticed, however, that the people weren’t saying anything about what happened. They weren’t admiring the view or complaining about the cold. They were all strangely quiet.
The Earth thought he liked them better that way.
The End.
At first the meteor’s pull on the Earth was as indefinable as emotion – little more than an idea tugging at his corners. Like happiness, fear, and excitement, it could be felt more than it could be explained.
As the meteor came closer, however, its gravity grew into something more concrete. The Earth’s oceans noticed it first. Suddenly disinterested with the moon, they found themselves attracted to the meteor, drawn to its rugged strength. Like crazed fans, they crowded the beaches and fought for the best view of its approach.
The Earth lit his northern lights to warn the meteor that it might be coming too close. Unfortunately, the stubborn forces of nature often ignore even the most heartfelt wishes and requests. The Earth didn’t know what to do. He had already done everything he could to control his future, and was worn out with the effort.
Until now, his path had been familiar and frictionless. Every day he moved through space carried by his own momentum, hardly working to spin through the seasons. In the vacuum, there was little need for effort or exertion. Nothing worked against him. Trusting his instincts and inertia, the Earth had taken for granted that he would always coast easily through life.
But now his forward motion was being interrupted by a sideways force. For the first time since he settled into the routine of orbit, The Earth felt resistance… friction… gravity pulling him in a direction other than the one he had always known.
As the meteor came closer, its gravity increased. Like a ball fighting to roll uphill, The Earth strained against its pull. When he tried to move forward, the meteor tugged him back. It didn’t matter how tightly he tried to hold to his orbit. The Earth was a movable object fighting an unstoppable force.
Finally, after weeks (or was it months? or years?) of straining against the meteor’s gravity, the Earth finally accepted what he could not change. He stopped fighting the invisible truth. Exhausted, he stopped running. For the first time since the meteor was sighted, the Earth relaxed and let nature take its course.
And as the meteor passed by – only 186 million miles away – its gravity wrapped around the Earth’s middle and slowly pulled him away from the sun and into the deep, dark unknown. The predictable curve of the his orbit was straightened into an infinite line. Like a hound chasing its quarry, the Earth left his home and followed the meteor into in the unknown of space.
When the meteor was first sighted, the Earth tried to save himself. He chose to run – to avoid the meteor rather than let it collide with him – and his plan worked. He hadn’t been destroyed by an impact. But despite his effort (or perhaps because of it), his path had been forever changed. Now, as the Earth followed the meteor past stars he had never seen, he wondered which was better, change or annihilation? He didn’t yet know.
He noticed, however, that the people weren’t saying anything about what happened. They weren’t admiring the view or complaining about the cold. They were all strangely quiet.
The Earth thought he liked them better that way.
The End.
Friday, October 9, 2009
Red Light?
New York is a pedestrian city. New Yorkers don’t walk for recreation or because we can’t find a closer parking place. In New York, the closest parking place is New Jersey. In New York we walk because it’s too expensive to hire a $20 taxi every time we leave the house. Poor and unwilling to remain confined to our apartments, we walk everywhere, littering the sidewalks with our smaller carbon footprints.
When we walk, we watch the traffic signals. New Yorkers know that when the green light turns yellow, the stream of cars blocking our path will slow to a stop and we can get an early start across the street. Unlike their suburban cousins, New York drivers are trained to never speed through a changing signal. In New York, running a red light means running over twelve people.
Last weekend, Jeremy and I were part of a crowd of NYU students and out of work actors crossing 18th street before we should. Several seconds before the red hand gave way to a walking man, a little girl on the opposite sidewalk stepped away from her father and into the street, following a herd of bad examples.
I saw the little blonde girl step off the curb, disobeying the red flashing hand that told her not to. Her father saw it, too. He shouted for her to stop, but in the chaos of the crosswalk it was hard to tell if he yelled more from fear for his daughter’s safety or hate for what his insurance company would do if she got hit by a car.
The little girl heard his shout and quickly stepped backward onto the sidewalk, safe and repentant.
When he knelt in front of the little girl and put his hands on her shoulders, the middle-aged man was still a father – angry, frightened, and flawed. But when he opened his mouth to scold his daughter, he was also something more – part prophet, part poet, part messiah. If the little girl remembers his advice, it will help her survive more than just the city.
“What have I always told you,” he said, sternly. “Don’t follow the people. Follow the signs.”
I listened too, and was thankful for the reminder.
When we walk, we watch the traffic signals. New Yorkers know that when the green light turns yellow, the stream of cars blocking our path will slow to a stop and we can get an early start across the street. Unlike their suburban cousins, New York drivers are trained to never speed through a changing signal. In New York, running a red light means running over twelve people.
Last weekend, Jeremy and I were part of a crowd of NYU students and out of work actors crossing 18th street before we should. Several seconds before the red hand gave way to a walking man, a little girl on the opposite sidewalk stepped away from her father and into the street, following a herd of bad examples.
I saw the little blonde girl step off the curb, disobeying the red flashing hand that told her not to. Her father saw it, too. He shouted for her to stop, but in the chaos of the crosswalk it was hard to tell if he yelled more from fear for his daughter’s safety or hate for what his insurance company would do if she got hit by a car.
The little girl heard his shout and quickly stepped backward onto the sidewalk, safe and repentant.
When he knelt in front of the little girl and put his hands on her shoulders, the middle-aged man was still a father – angry, frightened, and flawed. But when he opened his mouth to scold his daughter, he was also something more – part prophet, part poet, part messiah. If the little girl remembers his advice, it will help her survive more than just the city.
“What have I always told you,” he said, sternly. “Don’t follow the people. Follow the signs.”
I listened too, and was thankful for the reminder.
Thursday, October 1, 2009
SNAP!
Mice haven’t invaded my apartment, but they’re beginning to send spies. Every few days one scurries across my kitchen floor and hides under the stove. One by one they enter… but they never return home.
When the first mouse was spotted, my roommate shrieked, “it’s not even cold outside yet! I’m not emotionally ready for this!”
Is anyone ever emotionally ready for mice to invade their apartment? Isn’t the hallmark of a good invasion that it starts as a surprise? Would the Nazis have succeeded in occupying Eastern Europe if Hitler had RSVP’d with Poland for a September attack? Probably not. That’s why it’s important to end an invasion before it begins.
And so, with Old Testament vigilance, I’m catching the mouse spies one by one and killing them.
(Technically, and is the incorrect conjunction in the preceding sentence. The story shouldn’t read “I’m catching the spies and killing them.” It should read “I’m catching the spies by killing them.”)
SNAP! is my new favorite sound.
While I happily accept the role of grand executioner, serial killer, and/or instrument of rodent death for our apartment, Casey (my roommate) is a pacifist. She’s not offended by death, but she doesn’t think it should be forced on anyone (or anything). She wants the mice exterminated, but she doesn’t want to hear stories about it. Like the problem in Darfur, she’s aware of the killing, but thinking about it makes her sad.
Casey and I briefly discussed buying catch-and-release traps, but agreed that the theory behind catching and releasing is only effective if there’s an element of rehabilitation involved. Otherwise, your kindness is mistaken as hospitality. After the “release,” you’re practically guaranteed the mouse will bring its rodent friends back to your apartment to meet the nice people who keep filling the wire box under the sink with cheese and snacks.
The instructions for these pest-control placebos should read like the back of a shampoo bottle: “catch and release… and repeat.” Unless you have an infestation of golden retrievers, why bother?
It might be true that ever time a mouse dies, PETA cries… but in my opinion, the best way to catch a mouse is to kill a mouse.
***
Belly-up is always a posture of death. When you see a mouse trap flipped on its back, you know your resident rodent has finally joined Puckers – the goldfish you forgot to feed – on the other side of eternity.
This morning I looked behind the kitchen trash can to check a trap. It was sprung, tossed at a wild angle by the force of its snapping spring. The bait, a walnut tied to the trap with a piece of string, was completely intact and uneaten.
Beside the trap laid a dead mouse.
It wasn’t injured.
It wasn’t broken.
It wasn’t bloody.
But it was dead… next to the trap.
The mouse was resting three inches from the overturned trap, just far enough to blur the line between cause and effect. It was like finding a dead man across the street from a car accident.
Mysteriously, they both lay there, coldly divorced from each other, their bodies not even touching.
As far as mysteries go, “the case of the mouse who died, but wasn't caught” isn’t a very good one. I’m smart enough to know that cholesterol isn’t the only thing that causes heart attacks. When, on a calm autumn afternoon, your tiny mouse heart is already beating at over 9 times per second, SNAP! probably isn’t your favorite sound.
Animal rights activists can say what they want, but this confirms what I’ve always known. I’m not a killer… I’m a heart-breaker.
When the first mouse was spotted, my roommate shrieked, “it’s not even cold outside yet! I’m not emotionally ready for this!”
Is anyone ever emotionally ready for mice to invade their apartment? Isn’t the hallmark of a good invasion that it starts as a surprise? Would the Nazis have succeeded in occupying Eastern Europe if Hitler had RSVP’d with Poland for a September attack? Probably not. That’s why it’s important to end an invasion before it begins.
And so, with Old Testament vigilance, I’m catching the mouse spies one by one and killing them.
(Technically, and is the incorrect conjunction in the preceding sentence. The story shouldn’t read “I’m catching the spies and killing them.” It should read “I’m catching the spies by killing them.”)
SNAP! is my new favorite sound.
While I happily accept the role of grand executioner, serial killer, and/or instrument of rodent death for our apartment, Casey (my roommate) is a pacifist. She’s not offended by death, but she doesn’t think it should be forced on anyone (or anything). She wants the mice exterminated, but she doesn’t want to hear stories about it. Like the problem in Darfur, she’s aware of the killing, but thinking about it makes her sad.
Casey and I briefly discussed buying catch-and-release traps, but agreed that the theory behind catching and releasing is only effective if there’s an element of rehabilitation involved. Otherwise, your kindness is mistaken as hospitality. After the “release,” you’re practically guaranteed the mouse will bring its rodent friends back to your apartment to meet the nice people who keep filling the wire box under the sink with cheese and snacks.
The instructions for these pest-control placebos should read like the back of a shampoo bottle: “catch and release… and repeat.” Unless you have an infestation of golden retrievers, why bother?
It might be true that ever time a mouse dies, PETA cries… but in my opinion, the best way to catch a mouse is to kill a mouse.
***
Belly-up is always a posture of death. When you see a mouse trap flipped on its back, you know your resident rodent has finally joined Puckers – the goldfish you forgot to feed – on the other side of eternity.
This morning I looked behind the kitchen trash can to check a trap. It was sprung, tossed at a wild angle by the force of its snapping spring. The bait, a walnut tied to the trap with a piece of string, was completely intact and uneaten.
Beside the trap laid a dead mouse.
It wasn’t injured.
It wasn’t broken.
It wasn’t bloody.
But it was dead… next to the trap.
The mouse was resting three inches from the overturned trap, just far enough to blur the line between cause and effect. It was like finding a dead man across the street from a car accident.
Mysteriously, they both lay there, coldly divorced from each other, their bodies not even touching.
As far as mysteries go, “the case of the mouse who died, but wasn't caught” isn’t a very good one. I’m smart enough to know that cholesterol isn’t the only thing that causes heart attacks. When, on a calm autumn afternoon, your tiny mouse heart is already beating at over 9 times per second, SNAP! probably isn’t your favorite sound.
Animal rights activists can say what they want, but this confirms what I’ve always known. I’m not a killer… I’m a heart-breaker.
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