Thoughts of The End, It sits in your head and doesnt leave. Normally you can forget. You live a life and the life distracts you from that end. The trick to fighting the end is to occupy yourself with life and fight for every moment of it. This way, you can avoid thoughts of The End. Yet you can't fight. You were never able to build that muscle, much less flex it. The only reason its weakness hasnt been exposed is because nothing has yet to expose it yet- of course, The End will, and you know this. Thoughts of The End sit like a bowling ball in your throat. No amount of raw willpower, or hopeless distraction, or frenzied pleading can stomach it. It's a rock to an immune system.
When I'm at home sharing a cup of tea with the Thoughts of The End, I lean my head on my paw, and I ask it questions. It always has answers. It's never the ones I want, but they're answers, and I can die with that. I ask the Thoughts of The End what they've made me for breakfast this morning. They place an aluminium tray filled with cloudy drinks at my hands. We both take a glass and clink them together and take a sip. It tastes just how I remember. The Thoughts of The End offers me it's glass, they pester me to sample their beverage. I abide and chug it down. I toss the glass into the corner of the room- no matter. Thoughts of The End has another glass filled to the brim, just in case I didn't like it. It's very accomodating like that.
I look out across a sea of peers and ask them what they think. A wave of them crash against my vessel, one of them falls aboard. They say they've been waiting a long time to talk to me. I ask them what they want. They slap me in the face and walk away, and I ask myself what I expected. I look up to the sky in that moon is a gorgeous silky red. The light pounds my eyes. My old friend comes up from the stern of the ship. I look over my shoulder and ask the Thoughts of The End what they're doing here. They point a finger at the sky and say, Sue, look. It's The End. I just wave them off. It's not The End. If it was, I wouldnt even be able to recognize it, and even if I could, what would the difference be?
One of these days I'm gonna have to get up and be broken good and proper. The thoughts go back really far. Serve me a classic. One that everyone knows. Snap my leg clean in half. Leave it in a big bloody cast, hobble my walk forever. Get all the right stares from the onlookers. Collect their unsolicited comments like pennies in a piggy bank, and when I save up enough for a pretty benjamin I'm gonna board a flight to hell and book an appointment with the gods. I'll sit at their table and stall. "Hey fellas" I'll bark suddenly. "I've compiled a big list of complaints against me and you. Do you have the time to address these, or should I just go home?"
I remember when I was a kid there was a bunch of fir trees at the end of the road. There was a wendy's to its east. Things become a landmark for you. Everything in life is just perceptions. When you're young, these perceptions become cornerstones. You cant imagine the wendy's without the fir trees next to it. I remember the route from my house to school. Took a left, then a right at the playground, another right. Follow that road until you hit a row of trees. Theres a shortcut through them. Little sidewalk. Someone made that for pedestrians. Meant everything to me. Then you head right after you take the shortcut and its a straight shot to school. One of the crossing guards always gave out candy to the kids on friday and holidays. Meant everything to me. Then after her you made it to school. There was two buildings, the older kids went to the building that was built in the 30s, the newer kids went to the one that was built in the 90s. I remember heading into class and my oldest friend was there, Thoughts of The End. It sat me down and put a paper on my desk. I could write anything I wanted on it- So I figured, why not, I'll dedicate this paper to my old friend, Thoughts of The End.
One of these days, I'm going to wake up, and it'll be my last day with the Thoughts of The End. I'll take my drink, my penny, my answers and my bowling ball. I'll write to a penpal about hell and it's wonderful accomodations. They'll respond appropriately but hopelessly. Thoughts of The End look at me across from our little table. They dont even show a tell that its our last day together. I'll be none the wiser. I'll pry open the last book. I cross out all the words I don't like and scribble out the authors name with a marker. I get to the last page and write down my dreams, then I leave a bookmark there and stick it back on the shelf- just in case I need to return to it. The sun rises and I'm ready for bed. Time to knock out for tomorrow.