095 - Ninety-Five

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[click, static]

Hey Birdie. 

I got to the Grand Canyon. 

I can’t believe I called it a hole in the ground. It is…so much more than that.  

I’ve never seen anything like it. 

I drove right up to the edge—who was gonna stop me, right? And now I’m sitting on the hood of my car, watching the sun rise. 

The colors are extraordinary. The light and the shadows, the different shades of the earth. The bits of reflected light from the river down below. 

This isn’t—I don’t know what you meant yesterday in saying I was wrong about the impression I’ve left on the world, but I don’t think you really appreciate the comparison I’m making. I’m not denying that I’ve made choices that have had…devastating consequence. Even if you take some of the lesser choices—the ones that I don’t feel regret over—they obviously still had an effect on people. Every piece of art I helped steal had some kind of ripple effect. 

But the real mark—the one, the last one I left, I guess…I know—I mean, I can only imagine the, not even ripple, the wave that that left. I know that there are some decisions that will leave permanent marks. On you just as much as others. 

But I’ve—I guess I’ve comforted myself with the fact that it didn’t matter after all. Even if we hadn’t—even if I hadn’t done what I did, everything was about to change anyway. The “incident” or whatever it was happened and changed the world overnight—or maybe really gradually, I don’t know. Everyone either died or was…raptured? Moved into underground cities? Abducted by aliens?

I was a meteor, maybe. But the crater is impossible to see because a much bigger meteor came along and blew away the earth around my crater. I’m one wave inside of a tsunami. 

I—I think maybe I know what you were trying to say though. I’ve been thinking about it—and about you and what I know about you—and you seem to walk around your life with this immense burden of responsibility on your shoulders. You told me that what you did—whatever happened with your job—still matters. And I'm sorry, I’m sorry it’s still haunting you. 

But if you’re trying to tell me that what I do matters, that it matters just as much as whatever happened with you? Trust me, I get it. I heard that particular lecture pretty often, for six straight years, I don’t need it from you. Don’t project your guilt onto me. 

So I’m just going to sit here, watching the sun rise over this beautiful, natural phenomenon, and marvel at the fact that as much as I matter, nothing I could ever do would erase this view from the world. 

[click, static]

[beeps]

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