Talking to the Air
As the man stared at the empty bottle of bourbon, he contemplated the taste of backwash that lingered over the shore line. He spoke offhandedly to no one in particular, "Why must we all be reorganized when we only really wish we could start over for life?"
"It’s quite simple actually", said the air,"you must be reorganized because if you weren’t then what would the dirt consume after you’ve started over as, perhaps a cockroach?"
"Sorry, I don’t believe in reincarnation. By the way, where and who are you?"
"I’m the air. You know...the thing that you breathe in when someone else breathes it out. And it’s a shame you don’t believe in reincarnation, you could be so much happier."
"Nah, I’ve seen enough to believe that we aren’t reincarnated...maybe recycled but not reincarnated." The man sits back as he pictures thousands of roaches eating through the soil to an untimely demise.
"I guess that’s true, I mean...I am recycled. Everyone has breathed me once and some more than others even though no one can breathe more of me than anyone else."
"Sorry, I’m too drunk to figure that out", says the man as he fumbles for a cigarrette that dropped off long ago,"Fuck, I need something for this goddamn headache." Looking back at the shore, the man finds that his equillibrium wasn’t quite right yet so he watched all the passers by.
"What are you thinking about all those people out there anyway, said the air, I watch them run around never knowing why you are all so anxious to grow old only to wish to be young."
"What do you know about morality? You never die and always there, I can’t explain it to you." The man looked off again pondering how the hell he got into this mess and what they hell he took to make him talk to the air. "Uh look, it was nice talking to my thoughts, but I really must be going." As he stepped off the curb, the man was shot through the head by a kid trying to jump in with the local gang.
"Hmm, guess I should have warned him about the kid with the gun. Oh well, he’ll be reincarnated or go to heaven or whatever he believes...oh yeah, recycled. Life is a bitch and that kid is a son of it."
