A year from now, according to the Mayan calendar and sundry Nostradamus’s ponderings, interpretations of New Testament revelations, certain passages in the Koran, the decodings of Brad Meltzer and the History Channel, not to mention various rants of wild - eyed preachers, the world is supposed to come in an end. On December 21, 2012.

Gee, assuming they are right, we should maybe get our affairs in order!

If you do take stock in what they say, we are most likely to expire by starvation and draught. Foodstuff will suddenly diminish to the point of non - existence, and potable water will evaporate virtually overnight. We should survive about three days without sustenance before we go stark raving mad.

I can’t wait.

Never again will we have to fight off sleep while faithfully watching the Waterford crystal ball or bruised peach drop at midnight. Or being sadly uncomfortable hearing poor Dick Clark strain to wish us a huavptynoughears!

Assuming there is a degree of veracity in these predictions, why should I send in the exorbitant premium on my life insurance policy, due July 1st? Who will be around the collect the benefit on December 22? Who will pay it to my heirs? Like a vapor, we are all going to go poof, anyway.

Come to think of it, why bother sending in Federal or State income tax returns? No one will come after us if we don’t!

In fact, why bother with anything at all, like birthdays and anniversaries? Even showing up for annual physicals? Mortgages or credit card payments? Holidays? Vacations? Forget it!

Wait a minute. Maybe a vacation, a holiday, is just what we need. Why not book a trip to, say, the Greek Isles, my wife’s most desired destination? A trip around the world, a luxury cruise is called for, in a top deck suite, aboard, say, the Empress of the Seas? What do we care what it costs? We will never pay for it, anyway! Charge it on American Express or Visa!

Then, when December 21 is imminent, we can just sit back and say “So what? Sue me!”

Just think . . . It’s almost all over. Man, we have really lived! We have done everything we set out to do, and it didn’t cost us a single shilling! And now it's all over!

We have seen the Pyramids, the sunset on the Nile, the Great Wall of China, the Golden Gate Bridge, the Grand Canyon, the Statue of Liberty, Victoria Falls, the Hermitage, the snows of Kilimanjaro, the World War II Memorial, fat and grotesque women beating laundry on rocks along the shore while their kids frolic in the dirty water of the Ganges, the Sydney Opera House, the Great Barrier Reef, Baden Baden, a tribute to man's inhumanity, Mt. Everest, tobogganers challenging the Swiss Alps, the fiords of Sweden, Stonehenge, the Vatican, the Wailing Wall, Niagara Falls, the Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor, the blow hole on Kauai . . . Man, we have seen it all!

Now, what we have to do is simply lie down and die. It is, or soon will be, December 21, 2012. We’re ready.

I can see it now. I have gone to bed and pulled the covers up to my chin. My eyes are closed. I’m all set. Ready, willing and able.

Waiting

Waiting.

And waiting.

Nothing is happening. The clock on the bureau strikes twelve - oh - one. I am still here. My stomach is growling and my tongue is as thick as the pillow beneath my head. There is a pile of bills and collection notices on my desk. The IRS is pounding at the door.

I hear my wife off in the distance. “Rah - bert!” she calls out, stretching each syllable into the moaning whine of a lost loon. “You gonna go to bed without eating? You sick or something?”

Goddamn Mayans! Prophets! TV! Preachers! Liars, all of them! Tomorrow is the 22nd—and I have not bought a single Christmas present! No tree, no lights! Nuthin! God help us all!

Anyway, Hav - a - Happy New Year! If you can! There is still time!


Copyright©2011 by Robert A. Mills, all rights reserved