Apocalypse, But Make It Fun
Fosterverse Weekly #34: Just Another Doomsday Tuesday
Dear Diary—
It is 3am and I feel sure my body is for some reason keeping me awake out of spite. I hate this heedless wakefulness that seems to haunt me twice a month.
And yet, I adore few things more than being jolted awake in the middle of the night by fractals of ideas that refuse to be excised from my mind except by pen and ink.
When the world is still in darkness, I write by candlelight and feel a kind of communion of saints (or demons?) with Ben Franklin, James Madison, and Alexander Hamilton, men whose excessive public musings seem like they would only have been possible if, by the benefit of two sleeps, they wrote their most persuasive prose by the light of a candle at 2:00 AM.
The hours of the very early morning are such a singular, fleeting time. No one at this hour actually wishes to be awake. There is no FOMO, except for the missing hours of sleep. It is an hour laden with solitude, so fleeting as to disappear in a blink.
As I lie in bed attempting to sleep, my mind is busy, composing speaker panels out of names that have whizzed through my inbox, composing emails I need to send tomorrow, and posts I need to write and send soon.
Yesterday evening, I fell asleep and did not stir to consciousness once before I woke at 6:10am, realizing the morning alarm was just 30 minutes away.
Today, I am haunted by the Ghost of the Day Before and the Ghost of the Week Ahead, trying to manufacture extra hours of work out of what should be hours of rest.
I am haunted, too, by the end of the world.
Is it coming? Is it soon? I cannot allow myself to imagine that it will be as bleak as Denis Quaid and Jake Gyllenhaal would have us believe, or quite as violent as Kirsten Dunst (bless her resurrected actor heart) would insist.
How will we know if it’s an extinction event until it’s too late?
Almost no one will die like they do in the movies.
Instead, one by one, we’ll roll over and die in our sleep, not peacefully, but resignedly, both annoyed and relieved to at last be asleep rather than fitfully awake.
If The Secret is, in fact, true, then any time I spend mindlessly composing emails becomes part of the self-fulfilling prophecy that I will spend my life in one long unending email chain. Doomscrolling only begets more doomscrolling. And wouldn’t that be the worst absolute tragedy?
If the printing presses weren’t all dead already, the headline would read:
“Be Warned: Technojubilee found to cause life-ending despair!”
And in the meantime, what now?
What if apocalypse could be a little less The Day After Tomorrow and a little more Seeking a Friend for the End of the World.
Maybe it could feel like being a teenager, sneaking out of the house at night without your parents finding out, when your choices are “driving without a license” or “walk”?
I only did this a handful of times, but every time I did, it felt like an exciting, exhilarating event—like regardless of what happened next, at least I was squeezing maximum juice out of this moment of being alive.
When I think about “the end” we may or may not be living, I don’t want it to be filled with despair and anxiety. I don’t want to die wondering, WTF?
Instead, I want to let myself be overwhelmed by, “Why the fuck not?”
I want to plant a garden and make friends with people in my local “Buy Nothing” Facebook group, before the zombies take over the data centers and the social media companies finally expire. I want to stop paying taxes, parking tickets, and tolls, and throw epic potluck dinner parties where people leave talking about the incredible cherry-apple crisp they ate for dessert. I want to play ghosts in the graveyard and capture the flag after dark. I want to make friends with my kids’ friends’ parents so that they can be better friends, so I can die at peace knowing my kids will have people to cry with them when the zombies finally come for me.
Why do we despair so much about the end?
Death is guaranteed. As far as we know, it’s when, not if, unless you’ve already made a deposit on a slot in Vault 33. But if cryogenic survival is the next-best alternative, I’m not sure I’m cut out for the job. I’d rather enjoy this life right now, because it’s the best shot I’ve got to have a life filled with joy.
Instead of pre-grieving the death of modernity, what if we celebrate it instead? Not by scaling the walls of the capital brandishing the stars and stripes, but with a backyard bonfire, or barbeque, with laughs with new and old friends over mason jars of homemade kombucha, if I can ever get my scoby and my sourdough starter to get along.
When the zombies do finally break through the barbed wire around the compound, I want to die happy knowing that the short time I was fortunate to be alive was overflowing with kindness, solidarity, and joy. As they break down the door, smash the candle to the floor, and rip my pen from my hand, I’ll die at peace, knowing I died composing a history—a legacy—for the survivors to find and remember me by.
May the memory of each of us be a blessing.
THIS IS NOT A JOKE
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TODAY AT 1PM
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THINGS TO READ ON THE INTERNET
Will Louisville Ever Have A Vibrant Downtown Again? by
Certainty or Freedom? by
Your invitation to contribute to the 2nd annual State of Content Creation by
Making Crypto Mob-Proof in an Anti-Erotic World by
Would you walk 500 miles to find yourself in the wilderness? by
ARE YOU WRITING YET?
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is a Facilitator. She writes , works a day job in New York, and lives in western Connecticut with her family.