There is a sun in the sky, reasonably fresh air and 95% of the folks passing by are ordinary, harmless folk. Some of the passers-by are leaders and heads of state/industry. Unfortunately, those folk are oftimes not so harmless. There are a lot of different folks and It is an ordinary day here in our little town. There is a bit of traffic jam today in keeping with the rest of the world. We are, most of us, engaged in routine, leaving only a few exceptions. A few people are serial killing and getting elected and poisoning the atmosphere and hurting other people but not that many. Those few have a big impact, but they are only the few. Almost seven billion folks are just going about the everyday. Fetching water, looking in the fridge, making some food…scratching something out in order to continue being alive. These good folk are falling in love, raising children, feeding pets, cleaning the windows and building marijuana grow-houses for other people. We are myriad human beings just minding our own business. Almost no one wants more than to live and let live. Almost is a big word, though. There are always the ones who want to ‘Make America Great Again’.
Each era of our time is much different than the last but always ends in a recognizable fashion. We do keep on, though. We have changed much as we manage our virus-like spread around the globe. Starting off somewhere in Africa, as far as is known, by little old me, we rose up. A sweet woman named Lucy was our Eve by most of the agreeing accounts I have seen. From her and hers, we traveled, some of us bleaching out in the woods and cooler climate of Europe, while some of us stayed brown, even though the arctic circle beckoned and the polar bears could see us against all the white. When we realized how easy to catch we were, we put on funny hats, goofy shoes and painted our faces all kinds of colours and patterns. …might as well make the catching of us more fun! We built igloos where we (oddly) stayed warm, pyramids in Egypt, pyramids in the Yucutan, castles on high mountain tops in Peru and finally, enormous cities with towers of glass that scrape the stars. Along the way, we blew an awful lot of stuff up and killed a lot our fellows. We ate as much of the rest of the living things as we could cook. We did more, too. We built vaccines that have the potential to eradicate diseases and keep us alive. We built bombs that have the potential to destroy life on the planet and probably make the thing wobble even more. We have opposing thumbs and just because we could do it, we did it. We even invented chocolate fudge sundaes. (..and cherry pie, thank God!)
We come through a long line of cultures, governments, wars, famines, tragedy, success. Always building stuff and carrying stuff with us. Always, a purse or a backpack and a little house of some kind, a picket fence. I guess that makes us unique, we are show-offs and try to outdo the other life forms on this planet. “See, Mr. Mouse? I have built myself a much grander house than the little hole you call home! I have an indoor toilet and running water!” Most of the rest of the creatures just relax and watch us. They are shaking their furry or finny or feathery heads in disbelief. It is not an amused head-shake, not a jealous one, the creatures can see what we are really up to.
In each new age, we are stronger, there are more elaborate cultures, more stuff. We turn ourselves into birds and fly though the air, we turn ourselves into fish and dive down deep in the water, we dress ourselves up in exotic man-made fur-ish outfits and ‘discover’ the North and South poles. We use sophisticated tin can suits to go stand on the moon for a while or just float around way up high. Trouble is, we get covetous of stuff and blow each other up with ever more powerful explosions. We do it almost every time. We steal each other’s stuff and blow stuff up. Some of the explosions cause whole cultures to fall into disarray and the fabulous stuff gets wrecked. After the cultures rise and fall, none being the superiour of any other, we sift into the background a while but we don’t seem to die out. In all of our measureable time on Earth, we haven’t truly disappeared from anywhere but Easter Island. Egypt, the Mayans, China, the Norse peoples, Rome.. all of it has come and gone but folks kept on living there. Sometimes, we hide in the forest but we keep on a-going.
The rise of Europe, the spreading influence of the royal houses across the globe and the conquest of North/South America are just the latest of the great cultures to glow and fade. Fading is what we are doing now. That time of fighting over stuff and killing people and making pornography in Thailand hasn’t faded completely but is on it’s way out. There won’t be a Facebook when all of this settles down. It will settle. It will settle like the dust it always is. Not very long from now, some scratched up and bruised folks will be wondering, ‘what in the hell?’ as they go about their business, trying to find something to eat and drink and having their new leaders coax them into building stuff to steal from and throw at whomever remains. Perhaps, they will strip the stones off of the Washington Monument to trade for stuff other beat up looking folks have scrounged? Maybe, they will use the abandoned cars and buses for a house to proudly display. “See, Mr. Mouse/cat (it’s probably going to be a mutation due to the radiation), I have a fine house!” Yep. That’s where we are headed. I am packing my backpack now for the trip. Haha
Robert On The Air 