In the Future We Shall Not Thrive

“I think it’s a helicopter…” Ginger heard one man say, with a handkerchief around his nose – as if that was going to do anything to stop him from vomiting out his own intestines.

But It wasn’t a helicopter. It wasn’t a figment of her imagination, because she could see it too. It was a motherf***ing full on giant UFO. It just hovered and waited for everyone to drop off like flies.

Ginger was a beautiful sight in a sea of blights, despite her expression of helplessness. I could not help but zero-in on her. She was the only individual standing upright on a bridge. Everyone else keeled over with abdominal pain, retching, gagging, jaundiced, feverish, ready to collapse. Some were even bleeding from orifices – I’ve seen that before up close and it never fails to unnerve and frighten, even if you know the cause. Situation critical.

And yet, even in their weakened states, it was impossible not to be mesmerized by the otherworldly sight above them all. It was huge. It was confounding. On the flip side, from my vantage point, it was like a front row seat to seeing God appear from above in that final, transcendent moment before The End.

Don’t lie to yourself. If you’re an adult and maybe even if you’re just some emo kid like me, you’ve contemplated your death at one point or another, with one or two special anxieties unique to how you might go. Be it your history of family genetics, your own bad eating habits, or how often you decide to skip your morning run in favor of a Final Destination movies marathon.

Smoking. Booze. Drugs.

Pancreatic cancer. Cardiac arrest.

Choking on an olive pit.

Falling asleep at the wheel.

A serial killer. A hail of gunfire.

Hit in the head by a foul ball.

Childbirth. Shark attack.

Killer undertow.

Carbon monoxide poisoning.

A viral pandemic, man-made and systematically distributed through chemtrails and a global small pox eradication program (I’m looking at you, paranoid subscribers of The Truth Squad with Tad O’Malley).

The ways in which you can die are limitless. But let’s be real. How many of you really thought it would be an alien apocalypse? Well, well. For those of you who raised your hand, your time has come.