Vivian Anschauen spends an entirely enormous amount of her life waiting.  Waiting for people.  Waiting for things.  Waiting to see.  If our body parts were sized proportionally to the time we spend on various activities, and if our left big toes represented time we spend waiting, then Vivian’s left big toe would be down the street, around the corner, and out of sight. 

Waiting for news, waiting for orders.

In fact, Vivian sits in a waiting room right now.  This particular waiting room is at a hospital emergency facility on Signus II, a water world orbiting a very distant, very hot sun.  Signus II waits, also.  Waits for its moons to create tides.  Waits to inch closer to its star as its elliptical orbit contracts, then farther away as it recedes.  And, ultimately, the planet is waiting to die.  The sun will cool, swell into a giant, and envelope it.  One day, that star will eat this planet whole.

Meanwhile, the planet waits, and Vivian waits along with it.  She is happy.  This is peaceful.

"Because we do not know when we will die, we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. And yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number really.

"How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, an afternoon that is so deeply a part of your being that you cannot conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four, or five times more? Perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty.

And yet it all seems limitless..."

- Paul Bowles

reading

You buy them books, and what do they do? They eat the paper!

listening

Forget about your seat -- it's the beat.

viewing

Television will make you dumb. C'mon and get stupid!

Friday, July 09, 2010

Short Story: The Wait

Vivian Anschauen spends an entirely enormous amount of her life waiting.  Waiting for people.  Waiting for things.  Waiting to see.  If our body parts were sized proportionally to the time we spend on various activities, and if our left big toes represented time we spend waiting, then Vivian’s left big toe would be down the street, around the corner, and out of sight. 

Waiting for news, waiting for orders.

In fact, Vivian sits in a waiting room right now.  This particular waiting room is at a hospital emergency facility on Signus II, a water world orbiting a very distant, very hot sun.  Signus II waits, also.  Waits for its moons to create tides.  Waits to inch closer to its star as its elliptical orbit contracts, then farther away as it recedes.  And, ultimately, the planet is waiting to die.  The sun will cool, swell into a giant, and envelope it.  One day, that star will eat this planet whole.

Meanwhile, the planet waits, and Vivian waits along with it.  She is happy.  This is peaceful.

more...

posted on 07/09 • fiction • (2255) comments • permalink

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