Thursday, July 13, 2023

Story 500: Anniversaries

“I just realized: today’s my five-year work anniversary.”

“Really?  You’ve been here that long already?”

“I know, right?  It feels like I started last week, and then whoosh!  Five years flew past my face.”

“I actually didn’t think you’d make it past that first week.”

“Thanks.”

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 “Hey, babe?”

“Yeah, babe?”

“Since it’s our 10-year anniversary this year, I think we should do something really special to celebrate, like a trip across the state line, or jumping out of a launching space shuttle, you know?”

“Definitely!  Gotta commemorate the first 10 years of our life sentence, am-I-right?  Heh-heh-heh!”

“Hee-hee, that joke just gets funnier every year!”

“…OK, I’ll stop.”

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“I can’t believe it!”

“Can’t believe what?”

“Today is my 50th birthday!  Five-zero!  When did that happen?!”

“Today?”

“No, I mean, how did 50 entire anniversaries of my birth go by, and I manage to do absolutely nothing with my life?!”

“Well, I wouldn’t say absolutely nothing – ”

“Don’t patronize me!  Fifty whole years of mediocrity and inertia!  It makes one want to cry out, ‘What is the point of meeeeee????!!!!’”

“Usually I’d be crying that out right along with you, Captain, but ‘Dinner With the Passengers Night’ starts in about 10 minutes and if you keeping going on like this the cruise line might say you’re dampening the party-ship spirit.”

“Oh all right; I’ll pick up this up again when we get back here after dessert.”

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 “Wow, that’s amazing.”

“What is?”

“It says here that this statue was erected exactly 100 years ago… today!  What are the odds?”

“Astronomical.  So this statue’s a century old, huh?”

“Yeah; can’t you just feel the age seeping off of it?  The history?  The artistry?”

“Hmmm… doesn’t look at all like the person it’s supposed to, though.”

“I didn’t want to mention it.”

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“We made it!  Arrived exactly on the day this magnificent tree turns 500 years old!”’

“Wow.  Happy 500th Birthday, Tree!”

Thank you.

“Who said that?!”

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“And so, we commemorate the 1,000-year anniversary of the Battle of Hastings, marking the beginning of the current English monarchy, and indeed the British Empire as we know it today, except the Empire is basically back to just the one island again, and the monarchy are mainly figureheads, and the debate on whether the system should stick around or be dissolved completely goes on, but still: 1,000 years, ba-by!  Top that!”

“The Kush Empire lasted over 1,400 years.”

“…Great for them!”

“The Assyrian Empire also lasted over 1,400 – ”

“You from the U.S.?”

“Yeah?”

“Call me when you’ve collectively lasted a few hundred years more, m’kay?”

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“I just realized: the Earth’s having its 4.55 billionth birthday this year!  Plus or minus 50 million years.”

“Well, technically, the Earth wasn’t born from anything, so it can’t have a birthday.”

“Yeah it was: it was born from the planetary nebula that made the Sun and all the other stuff in our solar system.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Whatever; an anniversary of its existence, then?”

“Sure.”

“OK: the Earth is having its 4.55-Billionth-Plus-or-Minus-50-Million-Years Anniversary this year!”

“Wow.  Makes you realize the true vastness of the universe, and how miniscule and insignificant we really are.”

“Yeah…. What anniversary gift would that year be, you think?”

“I dunno.  Maybe a supernova?”

“Sweet.”

2 comments:

  1. Interesting evolving perspective

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    1. Thank you very much! - Jennifer

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