Thoughs of mortality on a Saturday night...

Good evening,

The night is a Saturday. The month December. The year is 2010.

I am 32 years old. Childless. Daughter to all or none or some. Single according to the government.

My backyard resembles a yard that a crater came shooting out of the night sky and sent snow flying into solid banks that encircle the patio. And that is where I lay. I don't feel the cold because I am not in a feeling mood. I stare up at the sky. There are stars, but they are faded and distant. If I were in California they would probably be magnificent and I could hang a dream or two on them. But here in Minnesota they are remote. Aloof. Dream free. They are winking at me. And I take it as an invitation to battle. Me vs. the stars.

Thoughts come rushing at me, it's like I'm not thinking them, but someone is throwing them at my brain like a bar dart. Aiming for the bulls eye, but hitting the peripheral instead. That bulls eye is protected like a national treasure.

Still laying here on the patio. Probably under this brick and this layer of clay and our plumbing and our foundation and then under this won't grow-a-fucking-thing soil are bones. I can see the bones like I can see the stars: dark matter and then a glowing light repeated like it's sewed into a quilt.

One day we will all be bones...or ashes, depending on your wishes. We go into the ground or on your mantel or scattered over a place you think matters to you. And those stars just keep on blinking. In one blink you're here and then you're not. Those bones are there with a steady stare. One big bone yard this country. Perhaps those bones will produce something that wars will be fought over one day. It doesn't matter to them because they are just watching, keeping time. They know we will join them soon. The stars just keep on winking, because they know the answer to the riddle and we lay on our patios trying to distract ourselves from the very thing that will kill us in the end.