February 2 Crescent Moon and Venus light up the night sky

 You’ve been trained for these moments, flat on your back, waving through the window and to the camera fixed above you. Adrenaline in check, concentrating on doing what you’ve done hundreds of rimes before. No room for anything beyond the immediate, because beyond is coming soon enough.

The craft as solid as a fifteen-story building, ready to shoot upwards at speeds you understand but as an abstract, from another reality, not one that can be seen or felt. Somewhere not far away every part of your body is being monitored, the pressure of your blood, the levels of oxygen and state of your major organs. Learning all they can whilst they can, before it’s too late. You can’t be certain if the thoughts in your head are private. It wouldn’t matter, every thought has been practiced before.

It isn’t your first time but will be the last. The interviews and counselling are over. You’ve embraced this, gone past mourning and into a kind of transcendental state. No need of disclaimers or paperwork now.

You are the first. A pioneer, about to leave in a way no-one has done before, not those executed by electricity or poison, or those who do so voluntarily, for whatever reasons they held. The first to leave everything and everyone who ever meant anything and still survive to see what is beyond.

Beyond the charts.

Ascension or rapture, the countdown is over and it begins.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

January 1 The ex-club doorman offering security to the stars

  “From tonight, you will be able to gaze upwards and see nothing save a cloud or two, and the distant twinkling light of something long gone, this will be the single most important act of the revolution to date: no messages, no adverts, no reminders, no instructions. I ask you not to be afraid, let us embrace how tiny we are. This is not retreating as the technologists claim rather a reclamation of our freedom to exist and dream, worry and imagine.” These words were found on a piece of paper, actually written down , as the man was fatally shot entering level four with a massive spanner.  Tests showed he had been drinking, add it to the next bulletin.
Read more

October 29 McGuinness 'under shadow of past'

My nephew Michael is seven today, he's opened his presents and been left with me to play marbles, his birthday present from an uncle we never see. I know he'd rather play with his Nintendo but he's been told to play with me first. I used to have the best collection of marbles in our primary school. The marble man used to appear every few weeks, he'd be on the other side of the fence and always had a handful of marbles for my sister and me. I must have been 10 ish which means Cath would have been 7. Our garden backed onto the Depot, an army base and if you went on the top of our shed it was possible to jump over to the fence, usually to retrieve a ball but sometimes just for the thrill of it. These were before soldiers carried guns as they patrolled the area. Mum and dad knew about the marble man and would smile as we shared our new marbles, steel ball bearings, tiger eyes, some pearlescent ones occasionally, deep blue. Never did we think he was anythin...
Read more