Stirring It Up After the Rapture

 It’s sort of trippy how the world just seems to be…back.  It’s like the Rapture in reverse: for weeks I moved about the suburbs of Chicago alone, for all intents and purposes.  Sure, there were other cars, but…c’mon!  We’re talking about CHICAGO.  The highways were practically empty.  Driving down 294 was like driving down the legendary Autobahn.  Or maybe like the Viaducto at 2 AM.

The office was pretty much empty, too.  Signs of life become fewer and fewer the deeper we got into December.  Where did all these people go, anyway?  Sour grapes, for sure, but it was so slow it hardly seemed worth taking the day off.  What a waste!  We could have drank coffee and eaten donuts, damn it!  Why didn’t you come in?!?!  Not that I didn’t enjoy the silence.  The deafening, oppressive silence…

But now everyone is back.  I think this will take some getting used to for those who disappeared for the entire latter part of December.  Some of the poor souls have this quasi-vacant stare on their faces.  I caught a few of them walking around in circles.  Others roamed aimlessly.  It was sad, really.  I feel bad for them and all of their time relaxing at home or traveling to distant lands.  Sour grapes, indeed…

So, I will accommodate those who have returned.  I will allow them a day or two to re-acclimate themselves to this daily grind, this race of rats.  Yes, reality will hit them soon enough, and the false sense of joy and serenity they have built for themselves will come tumbling down like the proverbial house of cards.  

And then we start stirring the pot.  We’ve got a world to change, folks!