Picture the scene:
The infinite blackness of nothing, in the relative centre, a dull speck of carbon amongst a sea of ebony.
BLINK
A subtle expansion and lightening at the core, a pale smudge of light in the enveloping darkness.
BLINK
BLINK
BLINK
The Universe, a rapidly expanding sphere, populated by pinpricks of sharp actinic light. Each one a galaxy of a hundred billion stars or more. Expanding as each component element struggles to balance the unseen forces which are fuelling repulsion, against the weaker attraction of an equally unseeable gravity.
BLINK
A galaxy, swirling through the void. Four spiral arms appearing poised to cast a multitude of stars aside, flinging them from the host to populate the dark that surrounds it, in a final futile attempt to maintain some last vestige of contact with its rapidly receding siblings.
BLINK
BLINK
A single lonely star, surrounded by an outer shell of trillions of cold ice crystals and rock pebbles, some the size of a small planet. Each jostling and jockeying for position trying to gain a glimpse of the far off spark of heat and light at the centre.
BLINK
A blue/green globe iron cored and sheathed in hairsbreadth of gas. The light refracted from it’s parent white star and diffused to a brilliant ultra-violet blue.
BLINK
BLINK
A single ribbon of black snaking through fields of brown swaying corn, the silence broken by the dull growl of millions of hydrocarbons sacrificed to the Gods of internal combustion.
BLINK
A father and son. The father peers straining through the fly specked windshield of the late model Ford SUV. Wishing for the umpteenth time that he’d remembered to put in his contact lenses before offering to take of Tommy on his drive to the mall. A dull throb heralds the onset of an Olympic Grade headache. Instigated by the gallons of dishwater that passes for beer in this part of the world and consumed the night before; exacerbated by the endless wailing of his son.
“But Dad, I wanna see the elephants.”
“Tommy, You can’t see elephants, I told you I was going to the mall, and you agreed you wanted to come to the mall”
“But Daaad, Why are there no elephants at the Mall. I wanna see the elephants. I like Elephants.”
“There are no Elephants at the Mall, Tommy. The Mall is designed for people to go shopping and buy things. If you wanted to see elephants you should have asked your mom to take you to the zoo. That’s where you find elephants.”
“But Daaaaad, the Mall advertises a petting zoo, so I demand they put in elephants. You don’t love me and the mall doesn’t love me if they don’t knock the buildings down before we get there and put in elephants. I wanna see the elephants.”
“Yes Tommy the Mall has a zoo of sorts, but as it’s designed and built for people, the zoo isn’t the main focus of the mall and so it’s restricted in the kind of animals they’ll let in. It’s just not built for elephants, It was never designed for elephants, there are no elephants at the mall. You knew there were no elephants at the mall before you said you wanted to come to the mall. Tommy, there are no Elephants.”
“But Daaaaaaad, I wanna see the elephants.”
Repeat Ad Nauseam.