May 19, 2020
About my stories:
I began writing short stories and posting them on my facebook as introductions to existential psychological questions I would then ask my friends there. I began this as a hobby, so as to keep me from going crazy when COVID19 “house arrest” injunctions were advised for all of us. Many years back when it was seen by my kids as embarrassing for an adult to be on fb, I had a similar psychological forum I facilitated just for my own entertainment. Though it seemed that at that time fb was quite strict and somehow some of the questions I asked were perhaps a little too provocative for some, and then I had my fb closed down. At that time I really could not comprehend why that was necessary at all, when the questions I was tabling seemed fun and innocent enough. I think that a few on the forum wall were arguing and then perhaps someone complained.
The stories that I have been writing are intended to be fun and humorous from the perspective of, let us say an alien visitor recounting past observations of their visit to our planet, principally during the time we live in during the COVID crisis and also the post-modern years leading up to this time when technology began to take a central place in our lives. As well, some of the stories, should they continue, are intended as an expose’ on what may come after life during this time. They are written as a means for me to engage like-minded people with similar concerns and who may share some of my perspectives – and as I said, to keep me from going crazy, during this disturbing period of history for many of us.
WHO NOSE:
Those peculiar talking animals often spent their time living in domicile like boxes. Rarely would they look out of what were called glass windows, for fear that someone think them strange that they had nothing to do, as they had this notion that they always needed to appear busy in “purposeful activity.” Before the time of COVID, in the street you could see them bumping into each other as they, it seemed, had to be solely engaged with a small black glass tablet they called smart phones. At this time in their history – they call it – this was when their thumbs on their hands became much more evolved in dexterity, due to what they call and communicate by “texting”. What they call video gaming, also contributed to this development of the advent of the thumbs up. Gradually they even preferred texting to talking with one another, even if they subjected each other to what they called “ghosting.” For in that time it was almost like the quantity of their “engagement” mattered more than anything so they could somehow distract themselves from what was really going on or not going on - like I am doing here now.
They began to love these black glass tablets of all kinds, more than real human interactions. Though alarmingly, a world plague set in, whereby they were to be “in it all together – yet stand as far apart” as they comfortably could. They called this social distancing. They were no longer to engage in touching with their hands and fingers, so they would not spread the disease about, which made sense. Though really, because of the rise there of their beloved, so called always brand-new fashionable tech, they really did not engage in much bodily contact all the same. So, it became fashionable to start using the tip of their noses instead, as there would be much less likelihood of interchange in touching and spreading the dreaded serious curse about. They used their noses for swiping on the glass black tablets and even swiping for their strange catalogue means of dating and seeking to “fall in love”! However, after years of this some of them realized they could not see what they were texting, so it did not make sense any longer! After a progressed period of time, many of them began to get Vitamin D deficiency causing optical neuropathy from looking at screens more than real life and from spending too much time in their beloved domicile boxes absorbing what is called blue light from their beloved screens, so into the future they eventually had to really develop their other senses to negotiate satisfactory existence. Though many could not easily decide which senses to develop? Should it be touching…hmmm, smell, taste or hearing. How would they decide? So which of your senses would you choose to heighten so that it was equally sensitive, say on par with your visual perceptual modality?
- Anonymous Contributor #6
The author of this post has chosen to remain anonymous. I have assigned a number to contributors who opt to remain anonymous. This is so readers have a sense of the number of different contributors that are involved in this continuously growing community.