Mind and Words

The Beginning of the End, is Another Beginning? What BS.

This is a nightmare. How did I get myself in this situation? A wave churns and pulls me into the dark recesses of the ocean. For a moment, I see nothing and then I'm quickly brought up to a glowing light. Another fireball swoops down and hurls into the water. The middle of nowhere. The Pacific? The Atlantic? Where were we when the shuttle came crashing down? The world is coming to an end and it will take me down with it, or some marine creature is going to take a big chunk out of me. Either way, it's bleak.

Just an hour ago, I was in a space shuttle from Spirit Airlines. "You get what you pay for" should be the motto.

Swirls appear. Either my vision is waning, or that's a flashback?

"May I interest you in something to drink?" A stewardess asks when she approaches with a cart.

I lean over to take a closer look at the items within the black metal box on rolling wheels. "What do you have?"

"For thirty-five dollars we have some oxygen shots for you. Aromatic and high quality, from the best laboratory in the country. Guaranteed to be 95% oxygen."

"No, thank you."

"We also have some courtesy high quality raw water from the local river?"

Did she just say from the local river? I scrunch my eyebrows. "What's wrong with tap or regular bottled water?"

She shakes her head at me and laughs.

"Oh, you were serious? Don't be ridiculous, no one does that anymore." She says as she places the recycled bottle in my hand. "You know, Uber now has transport shuttles and can stop by to bring whatever you order. All you have to do, is use," she inspects me momentarily. "The white courtesy phone down the path." She points down the aisle.

"Right over there?" I look through the long and looming hall, that has a bright light at the end. This is Economy, that over there looks like heaven compared to the cramped space I'm in.

"Yes, down there. Near the first class spa with the sign that says Hay Baths. You'll smell it once you near it."

Uncomfortably shifting in my seat, I lift my hands up and say, "it's all right."

Another stewardess approaches me with a stack of books and papers.

"May I interest you in something to read? We have War and Peace, The Prince, The Holy Bible, How to be PC volumes one through five, Gravity's Rainbow—,"

"Just something light please."

She hands me a leaflet titled African-American Women Elected to Congress.

Staring at her, I'm at a loss for words. "Ok ... thank you?" The paper contains twenty-two names in two charts. Twenty-one are in the first chart titled The House and one is in a small chart underneath, titled the Senate.

The shuttle begins to jerk and shake. My hands try to grab onto something—anything—but the seats have no armrests. I grab onto the gentleman next to me that eyes me nervously.

The rest of the passengers start commenting amongst each other and some child screams from somewhere in the front.

One of the stewardesses runs past me to the front of the aisle. "What's going on?"

A man groans. I lean over my neighbor to have a better look.

"He seems to be suffering from chest pains." A man kneeling in the aisle says. He removes the stethoscope from his ears.

"His chest? What is it?" The stewardess asks in shock.

"It's an anatomical part of the body located between the neck and the abdomen. Containing vital organs like the heart and lungs, but that's not important right now. We need to move him out of this area quickly."