Mars Marley

The Great Depression

The panic that ensued mirrored that of the hysteria of Y2K; rioting and looting, apocalyptic utterances; the end of the world. Big and small businesses alike relished in the pandemonium that drew the forsaken to their store fronts, emptying their stock like “out of business” liquidation sales. Their jubilation quieted once the contagious virus of paranoia coughed up and spat upon the walls of their establishment. The infection spread. The chatter from the informed, over various mediums, were convinced the end of days were here. The diagnosis was delirium, and prophetic pharmacologists prescribed unhealthy doses of folklore and nihilist fiction as the remedy. The foreseen panic in scripture was created today by fear frozen sheep unable to see the strings animating their movements, decisions. It was true that the water levels had risen, depleting hundreds of square inch of land monthly, and it was true that natural disasters were becoming more common, shifting the traditional worldwide reaction to them from disbelief to disregard; but the horsemen of the apocalypse never came. The earth did not open up and swallow its inhabitants without warning. The great asteroid that made fossil of skeleton and dust of flesh, of our reptilian ancestors, did not return for a curtain call. Monday through Sunday continued as did January through December. The sun rose in the east, smiling, and set in the west, yawning. The predictions were not entirely wrong though, just misinterpreted in their translation. A global change occurred, derailing our affinity to function on auto pilot, with eyes closed, led like lemmings off a ledge. The people woke up and set fires to their property, ceremoniously sacrificing the past for present favours from Gods found within. Our perceptions had changed. Protests ceased as their functions became unnecessary. Influence and coercion were ineffective as truth was now widely accepted as being verified solely from the “mouth of the horse.” The financial elite no longer dictated the ebb and flow of commerce, religion and government, because all of earths dependant’s chose truths that were symbiotic with their own heart’s desires. Relief set in, and emotions teetered to a plateau as the fear began to diminish; but that was just the prologue. That was December 21, 2012.