“Cannon to the right of them; cannon to the left of them; Into the jaws of Death… rode the six hundred.”
-The Charge of the Light Brigade - Tennyson
So what now, Voyager?
Well, with cannon on both my flanks; with the enemy commander on the hill raising his saber as a precursor to the pending bombardment; with the irreversible treadmill of Life pushing me slowly towards the valley of Death, I’d say the options are a bit limited: Either continue at my current pace and be blown to smithereens or reach over and switch the speed setting on Life’s treadmill from ‘Normal’ to ‘Turbo’ and be violently jettisoned into Death‘s waiting jaws. At this precise and dreary moment; at this nadir of my life, and taking into consideration the fact that I feel that I’ve accomplished about everything I had set out to do, the latter has a certain appeal. But it’s the option I simply cannot choose due to the crushing impact it would have on those who, for some odd reason, still choose to regard me with love, honor and respect.
Damn it! The dictionary declares that ‘death’ is a noun - a person, place, or thing. That being the case, it should have form or substance instead of being an invisible ninja. If it had form, I would choose to go out with a lot of defiance and a little glory - shake the dust off of my horseback riding skills, mount my steed and, with sword in hand and an aging warrior’s shout, charge and perhaps impale the Beast once or twice before the battle reached its inevitable climax. Now that would be a nice way to go! However, back to the stark reality of Life having me in the cross-hairs of its cannons, ready to commence lobbing cannonballs at me from all sides.
So what now? Screw it! Let’s see how well I can still play Dodge Ball.
“Hey, you! Up on the hill! Yeah, you with your fat ass on the horse with your saber in the air! I’m ready when you are!”
Copyright February 2010 - phil cerasoli
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