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| Black Holes |
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| Black Holes by Asterio Enrico Gutierrez LORA WOKE up half past noon. The beam of sunlight slanting through the window hit her full on the face, harsh and heavy, until her brow furrowed and her eyelids flickered. She shut her eyes and twisted to her side, and stretched out her arm to reach for Eric. It fell upon empty space. In an instant she was awake, sitting up, her head swiveling from side to side, a heavy throb in her ears. A full minute of panic and consternation passed before she sighed and slumped back into bed, remembering he was gone. She lay buried in the sheets another half-hour, struggling in vain to drift into sleep once more, before standing up, washing her face, and making breakfast. While sipping her coffee, she mused over her morning rituals of late, and how they had changed. Just last month, mornings like this, her arm would stretch out and drape around his sleeping body. Then after she had washed her face and made breakfast, he would be sitting across the table, sipping his coffee in silence while she flipped through a textbook, preparing the lecture she would give her freshman Physics class that day. After breakfast he would take out the shirt and slacks from his duffel bag while she ironed her skirt and blouse. Then they would set off for the university, he driving while she continued her reading. It had been like that since they graduated and began teaching while simultaneously finishing their master’s degrees (he in English Literature, she in Physics), and did not look to change for years to come. They were going to marry eventually, but not just yet, not when there were renewals and permanencies to ensure, graduate and post-graduate studies to finish, not when money was tighter than how they held hands. Then the letter came. She wondered why the news had shocked her then, how she could have been unprepared. He must have told her he had applied for scholarships from schools abroad for his Ph.D. She must not have been listening, busy computing grades or finishing a segment of the paper she was writing, or attending to whatever else needed her attention. When he told her, she merely nodded and chewed her lower lip, unable to ask what was to become of them, afraid of the answer he would give. While he fixed his passport and travel papers, she began buying him small gifts, writing him letters, postponing urgent work to stay out late on some carouse downtown, then responding passionately in bed later. The last embers of hope were finally doused when the English department chair asked her why he had not secured a leave of absence. She confronted him and begged him to stay, telling him how they had their moments when they were together. He answered, almost apologetically, “You can’t build relationships on moments.” A week before he left, they broke up, both aware of the futility of long-distance relationships. She did not see him to the airport. Sprawled on the couch in her flat, she watched the airport schedule channel. A shudder, then her eyes rippled into twin puddles as the flashing “boarding” signpost of his flight switched to a cold, irrefutable “departed.” She checked her palm top. Like most Saturdays since Eric had left, her day was empty—only a trip later that afternoon to the university to pack the last remaining things from her cubicle and bring them home. After that, nothing, no dinner out, no show to watch. Just another long vigil alone in her flat. A long sigh escaped her. When she sipped her coffee again, it was already cold. THERE WERE no footsteps, no voices, when she entered the faculty room. Only Maribel, the young secretary, who engaged Lora in perfunctory small talk as she passed her desk, cut short when Lora waved her hand in a dismissive gesture. She walked along the empty aisles on her to way to her cubicle, sighing in relief for the absence of the other teachers. She had just accepted an offer as a researcher for the government-run Quantum Physics lab and resigned two weeks ago, a month after Eric had left. The two events elicited the expected responses from her co-teachers all she had been hearing since was the din of congratulations and condolences. But inwardly, she reveled in the achievement. She knew it was an unprecedented, tremendous honor to be offered the post at such a young age, a suiting culmination of all the years she had put in, all the sacrifices she had made. And in the wake of Eric’s departure, it was the only thing she had. She sat down and surveyed the few things she had not yet taken home – mementos of their relationship. She had planned on packing the various trifles first, but upon touching them, an almost physical pain ran through her, like something inside her chest had caved in. There were only a few items, hardly enough to fill a fourth of the box: a framed photograph, an old paperback of Crime and Punishment, and a thick bundle of miscellaneous souvenirs and letters, some of which she had yet to read. Picking up the picture frame, she noticed the dust motes that specked the glass window, took out a tissue from her purse and wiped it clean. The colors became more vibrant, the photograph more real. They were locked in an embrace, wistful smiles penciled on their faces, against the backdrop of a glassy lake punctured by the small cone of a volcano. They had been in Tagaytay that afternoon. It was a month after college graduation, and the trip had been their first date out of town, at least without friends. Over lunch, they giggled at the Koreans who raucously played a peculiar kind of hopscotch along a path of stone steps lining the picnic grounds. Then an outrageously priced jeepney ride took them to the Palace in the Sky, where they stood whispering as they watched the mountaintop view. Later, nestled in each other’s embrace as they silently watched the sunset, she felt like the wind caressing their faces: light, gentle she had never felt as in love. She fingered the photograph as she tried recalling other similar moments they had stumbled upon amid the preoccupation with their M.A.’s and their teaching posts that soon followed and never let up. She soon realized there were no other moments. At least none she could remember. The photograph in her hand was the only proof there had ever been such a moment at all. She tucked the picture into a corner of the box, and picked up the copy of Crime and Punishment. Ever the literature professor, he made it a point to regularly gift her with novels he had read and was eager to share with her. Almost every month, he would give her a classic he had dug up from some random Booksale branch, always carefully scotch-taped at the corners, until she had a small library crammed with books she had neither the time nor the inclination to read. The Good Earth. Heart of Darkness. Madame Bovary. Howard’s End. Also, Without Seeing the Dawn. Dekada ’70. Even an autographed copy of Killing Time in a Warm Place. Crime and Punishment had been the last. A week before the letter from the US arrived, he left it on her desk, as he often did. When she came upon it, she had offhandedly shoved it into her cubicle’s shelf, along with the textbooks and science journals lining her desk. She thumbed through the unread pages, brittle and yellowed at the edges. A folded slip of paper fell out. She had not noticed it before and immediately hunched to pick it up from the carpet, eager to read what he had written, hear what he had to say, even if it was then, and it no longer mattered now. Soon as she read it, she shut her eyes and crumpled the note in her fist. It was the book’s receipt. She slid the rubber band off the bundle of letters. It was a sheaf of various communications - snippets of poetry, short notes he would leave on her desk, five-page letters written longhand. Some were from years ago, when they were still in college others, just days before he had learned of his scholarship abroad. Some were postmarked Tokyo, Japan, written and sent when he had spent two weeks there attending a literary conference. She brought the envelope flap to her mouth, kissing the traces of his lips. Towards the end of the bundle she came across a sheet of paper on which formulas and equations had been scribbled in a familiar hand. A knot curled on her brow. She flipped the paper around. It was short note written in his hand. She checked the date scrawled on top, and understood. It had been written the semester she was working on her graduate thesis. In the rush and crush of her work, she had used some of his letters as scratch paper, noting down her precious formulas and equations, intending to read what he had written later. It was only now she had found time to read them. They were mostly of support, telling her how proud he was of her achievements, while a few were more forlorn, asking if they could spend more time together, time she would now give, but could not. At the bottom of the bundle was a pamphlet from a space museum. Her face softened in recognition and reminiscence as she unfolded the frayed, faded three-fold pamphlet. They were in college then, and that afternoon he accompanied her on a visit to a space exhibit from NASA. When they stopped in front of the glass display describing black holes, he looked up, and said, thoughtfully, almost reverently, “Look at that. Black holes. Think about this – stars live millions of years. Planets roam about them in unyielding orbit, seemingly unmindful of their existence. But when the stars flare out into the nothingness of black holes, they spawn a boundless force persisting long after the husks have disappeared, pulling across the infinite vastness of the universe, distorting even time and light. That’s something.” A wistful smile stretched across her lips. That was how he remembered him: profound, always seeing things in a different light. It was how he had learned to appreciate her Physics. She checked her watch: 6:24. Packing the few items had already taken three hours, she realized. She took a deep breath and nodded to herself, resolving not to waste anymore time grieving. The rubber band slid around the sheaf of letters, which she tossed into the box. Smiling, she picked up the box and headed for home. HER ANSWERING machine reported two messages. A familiar baritone droned through the speaker, asking if she was doing anything next Sunday: Perhaps we could have dinner, watch a movie? She grinned at the invitation. Soon as Carl, her former co-teacher, found out Eric had left, and left her, he had been calling up almost every night and keeping her company at school, with obvious opportunism badly concealed as concern. Maybe if he did not resemble Eric as much, she thought, as she deleted the message. The next message was from Trisha, a former co-teacher of Eric, asking if she could borrow her copy of Madame Bovary, and adding, offhandedly, if she wanted to go out on a blind date with her cousin. She grinned again, and let out a giggle. Since Eric had left, her girlfriends had been trying to fix her up on dates with all the single men they knew but did not want for themselves. Maybe now she would take them up on their offers. She deposited the box into a closet, along with the rest of the things he had left – the crate of books, a small box containing figurines and photo albums, and another stuffed with clothes he had left in her flat and forgotten to reclaim. She tucked them into the innermost corner, far from memory’s way, and shut the closet door, then turned and retreated to her bedroom. It was as she had left it, as it had been the past few weeks. The rumpled sheets were twisted and sprawled around the bed. A maddening silence hummed. Since he had gone, the room seemed bigger, and emptier, filled only by echoes of memories she bled almost every night. She turned on the radio, something she had not done in a long time because of the love songs ringing all too familiar. As she sang along with Janet Jackson, she unbuttoned her blouse, sloughed off her skirt, and made her way to the bathroom. She tossed her clothes into the hamper by the sink, then took off her undergarments and stepped into the shower. Clad in a bath robe, a towel rolled around her head, she sat down in front of the computer and switched it on. As the monitor lit up and the CPU whirred, she picked up the topmost volume from the pile of books littered across the floor beside the computer and took out the index cards tucked in between the pages. She was writing a paper she was to submit to an International Physics journal, which, if published, would certainly bring about invitations for lectures and columns for science journals. It was almost finished just a rewrite of the conclusion, then a complete grammar and spelling check for the whole paper – the same work that remained the day he told her he was leaving. She clicked the mouse, opening the file, and poised her fingers on the keyboard. Minutes passed, the silence not broken by the rustle of a turned page, or the clatter of the keyboard. Sighing, she dropped the book and flicked the switch of the computer. She lifted her knees and drew them against her chest, cradling them in her arms. Her listless gaze shifted to her bed. She could not work, unlike before when she would type until dawn while he fell asleep in her bed waiting for her to finish. Suddenly restless, she stood up and made her way to the window, parted the curtains, and peered outside, her gaze drawn by something unseen. For the first time in so long, she realized, she saw the night sky – a blanket of the deepest blue spangled by a million flickering stars. If only he could be here, she thought, if only they could share the sight. He would undoubtedly find something profound, and tell her about it. A film began to glaze her eyes as she recalled the space exhibit one afternoon so long ago and far away. Stars live millions of years. Planets roam about them in unyielding orbit, seemingly unmindful of their existence. But when the stars flare out into the nothingness of black holes, they leave a boundless force persisting long after the husks have disappeared, pulling across the infinite vastness of the universe, distorting even time and light. She shivered. Tears deepened the blue of her sheets. When dawn broke, in her bed she lay huddled, the empty space around her drawing her close. |
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| Added On: Thu Sep 11 2003 | Hits: 2 |
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| crazy littl....... |
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| Crazy Little Thing Called Life by : ed harrison You may say it's a curse or that black cat you tripped on this morning. It could be Nemesis pinching your ear for accidentally killing your grandfather's goldfish when you were three, or just plain bad luck. Bad luck is a pretty flexible word though. It could include anything, from coffee spilling on your new shirt to getting yourself electrocuted while changing a light bulb. So I'm just sitting here as contented as anything, writing this article and listening to Mozart, and then suddenly the ceiling falls down right on my head. Could you put that in the same category of bad luck as missing the bus? Come on, be fair! If I could divide bad luck into categories, like mild, medium and real bad luck, I'd put the ceiling story in a milder category than missing the bus. You know why? Because at least when the ceiling falls on my head it's a swift, painless death (provided a real big chunk of it falls down). But standing in the middle of a thunderstorm to find a cab, now that's what I call catastrophe! But never mind all that. Sometimes bad luck takes it a bit too far testing one's patience. I believe that bad luck's just some sort of an imp somewhere that really gets a kick out of making our lives miserable. I can picture it right there, sitting on top of my monitor, dangling its feet and smiling impishly (well, it's an imp, isn't it?), and preparing to make my system crash or something. Now isn't that sweet? I'd be losing all my data, and it'd be as infernally happy as a divorce lawyer getting paid. But all that still doesn't count as bad luck compared to what one of my friends has been through a couple of months ago. Now listen carefully and consider yourselves really lucky! This friend of mine had a car, a Mercedes convertible that was her pride and joy. Not everyone has a Mercedes convertible these days, as you may already have realized, and that's why this white, flashy work of art was always very well taken care of. She was only that close to taking it up to her apartment for all I know! How she got the car is unimportant, as it will lead us into a long story of other people's misfortunes (keeping in mind that my friend here is actually a divorce lawyer). Anyway, a couple of months ago, she parked the car very carefully in the parking lot two blocks away from her place and just walked away. Two hours later it wasn't there. Who took it or how they took it will forever remain an unsolved mystery. She panicked, called the entire navy and nearly had a stroke. However, she had a very important meeting with a client that day (a lawyer has to eat, you know, and buy a new Mercedes convertible as well, just in case the old one couldn't be found), so she just took a cab and prayed for the best all the way to the meeting. Half way through the meeting they called to inform her that the car might have been found. So far so good, right? Wrong! The car was found indeed, and inside it were a gun and almost a kilogram of dope. These things happen, you know it could happen to you. Remember the ceiling thing? Anyway, there was my friend, all power suit and nervous breakdown, sitting for interrogation for nearly 11 hours! You must all remember that divorce lawyers are cunning weasels, but they're not as tough as other lawyers. She was in tears all through the procedure, and finally they let her go after an endless series of tests proved that the stuff in her car wasn't hers at all. No, no, don't let this sigh of relief out yet! I promised you a disaster, and that's exactly what you're getting! The car was confiscated of course, and to get it back she would have to wait until the owner of the gun and the dope was found, which would be a year, give or take a few months. She nearly had a fit when she heard that, but life must go on, so she borrowed her sister's Beetle. Just for you to know, it was an old, battered Beetle, not the cool new one. To know how that feels, you only have to live in Bel Air for three years then move into a hut in the jungles of Zimbabwe. It sure did hurt, and she had to park it about ten blocks away so that no one would see her getting out of such a shameful garbage can - no |
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| Added On: Sun Oct 5 2003 | Hits: 1 |
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| Waiting in the Desert |
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| The caravan pulled off the interstate on a county road. Soon they abandoned that as well in favor of a dirt road. They drove on it for a bumpy half hour, and then they stopped. John Stavros got out of his SUV and surveyed the area. As Mike had promised, they were on top of a hill. It was rather flat, and the downward slope of the surroundings was barely perceptible. Nonetheless, the location offered a panoramic view unmatched in the Mojave Desert. Excellent seats for the grand finale. Stavros looked up at the night sky. A sickle moon hung low, and myriads of stars dotted the heavens, so close together that they formed an almost uniform curtain of pale light. His target had just appeared over the eastern horizon. Already it was the brightest star on the firmament. …………………………………………………………………………………………… The discovery of asteroid 1376127YH had caused quite a stir in the astronomic community. Its calculated trajectory appeared to pass alarmingly close to Earth. The media quickly picked up on the story, feeding the public’s fears. The roughly cylindrical object was twenty miles long and ten miles in diameter. It was big enough that, in the event that it hit the planet, it would wipe out every living being with the possible exception of bacteria deep in the soil. Then official sources from most developed countries announced that Earth would be spared. Yes, the asteroid would come really close to hitting the planet. But its orbit had been precisely determined and they were happy to report that there was no danger. The masses breathed a collective sigh of relief and the media quickly returned to its usual stories about terrorism, the extremely dirty election campaign and the latest Hollywood marriage or divorce. After all, the smart boys and girls with the fancy gadgets, Doppler lasers and satellites could not be wrong. The university where John Stavros was teaching astrophysics also had smart men and women on its payroll, and it possessed some good telescopes too. Not as good as those of NASA or Space Command, but good enough to tell the real story. The asteroid would not miss. They tried to contact the government agencies and let them know of their error. Their warnings fell on deaf ears. John knew scientists from other private institutions or academia who had also become aware of the apparent miscalculation and had tried to make their voices heard, but the government had refused to acknowledge them. The media, ashamed of the panic it had almost created, also dismissed their warnings. And Cassandras quickly realized the grim truth. The world leaders knew the asteroid would hit Earth. They also knew there was nothing they could do to prevent it. Technology to detonate nuclear bombs close enough to the asteroid to deflect its trajectory did not yet exist. The most powerful intercontinental ballistic missiles could barely rise out of the atmosphere, and when the asteroid was that close to Earth there was no way to push it away. And even if all the nuclear bombs in the world were detonated on its surface, the rock would not break up. The most nukes could do was dig shallow craters in its surface. The world leaders had decided to give humankind the gift of ignorance. During its last weeks, civilization was spared of mass panic, riots, or worldwide depression. Knowing there was no hope for survival, John and his colleagues had decided to at least watch their demise in style, apart from the unsuspecting world. Most of the faculty in the astronomy department, and a good number of students too, had driven together deep into the desert. Those who were married had brought spouses and kids along. ……………………………………………………………………………………………… They walked a few hundred feet away from their cars and set up camp. A very short-lived camp, John thought. The children were merrily chasing each other, innocently believing they were on a field trip to watch the big star pass by. They were confused when parents would from time to time come in their midst, grab their offspring for a few moments and smother him or her at their breast, chocking back tears. John Stavros didn’t have any family. Currently he thought of it as a blessing. He raised his gaze again. The star had risen in the sky, and it had also gotten brighter. His watch showed three hours left till impact. Wanting to get a closer look at the asteroid, he approached Mike Chalmers. The older man, a bachelor like John, was peering through a huge pair of binoculars. Lighting a cigarette, John asked: “Studying your executioner? Can I borrow those?” Mike turned with a grim smile: “That’s the most I can do.” He handed John the binoculars. “Knock yourself out.” John peered at the asteroid. Through the binoculars, it looked about as big as the moon seen with the naked eye. He could easily make out the potato outline and the jagged edges. The surface was pockmarked with craters made by smaller objects that had hit the asteroid during its billion -year journey, which would soon end. Tonight 1376127YH will be the one making the crater. He returned the binoculars to Mike: “Do you hear the animals? In all the nights I spent in the desert, I have never heard such ruckus.” “They can feel it coming.” As if to underscore his words, a pack of coyotes nearby howled in unison. “They feel earthquakes before they happen too. I wonder if they know they won’t make it through this one. Can I have a cigarette? If there ever was a good time to restart smoking…” They smoked together in silence, both deep in their thoughts. John tried to grasp the concept of his own death, which would occur in only a couple of hours, but failed. At the same time, he knew exactly how it would happen. The asteroid would strike somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. At the place of impact, immense quantities of water would vaporize instantaneously. Waves that made the tsunamis look like ripples in a pond would soon assault the shores of Asia and the Americas, wiping away everything for thousands of miles in their path. Earthquakes would resonate through the entire crust of the planet, and active and extinct volcanoes would spill their lava with fury. They would add their clouds of ash to the material ejected from the point of impact, covering the sun, poisoning the air and killing, within a year, every creature and plant that had survived the collision. John knew that the western United States, from California to Washington, would be swept by a tidal wave thousands of feet tall. Within hours, similar waves will hit the Eastern shores of the continent. People high in the Rockies might survive for a while. Whatever kind of existence that would be, he will not know. He and most of his fellow astronomers had decided not to attempt to prolong their lives by engaging in a desperate fight for survival on a dying planet. This way, at least it will be quick and probably painless. He checked his watch again, then the skies. Only an hour left. The asteroid was now directly overhead. It was so close its reflected light obscured the stars and bathed the landscape in a faint white glow not unlike that of the full moon. He looked around. Mike had resumed his observations, muttering under his breath. Most of the children had fallen asleep in their sleeping bags. Their parents, holding hands, sat on blankets next to them, talking quietly, holding each other and sometimes caressing the children’s foreheads. In a few places, tents had been erected, where young couples were spending the last hours together as pleasantly as possible. Stavros felt a pang of envy. Loneliness overwhelmed him. Nobody to hold him in his last moments…he let himself fall on the ground and sobbed for what seemed like hours. Ashamed, John sat up and cautiously looked around. Nobody had noticed him. Many were looking at the asteroid. He straightened and checked his watch again. Half an hour left. He started shaking, but through great effort he maintained his composure. He raised his gaze and turned it to the west. There it was, brighter than ever. Was he detecting an undulating wake, burning material peeling off as the asteroid entered the atmosphere? No, it was still too early for that. He got on his feet. He noticed that a lot of people were standing now, all gazing west. Parents were holding their sleeping children in their arms. Nobody was moving. The white, unnaturally strong light coming from the west made their faces look ghostly pale. And, John thought, ghosts they were indeed, every single one of them. Still alive, but already dead. Then he became aware of the eerie silence. Nobody was talking, not even the desert, which had a billion voices it could use. Every creature lay in waiting. The asteroid was just now encountering the outer fringes of the Earth’s atmosphere. Its profile became wavy, as entry heat enveloped it in a mantle of plasma. Its brightness increased tenfold, and a trail of burning material marked the meteor’s path through the atmosphere. Lower and lower it got, until it disappeared behind the horizon. Less than a second later, a distant flash marked the encounter between 1376127YH and Terra. After the momentary brightness, the night suddenly seemed much darker. John tensed. It won’t be long now. He started counting the seconds. When he heard the rumble, deeper than anything he had heard before, the scientist in him calculated the distance to the point of impact. Another part of him was laughing sardonically. Like it made any difference how far it was. He braced himself, and soon enough the expected shakes came. Their amplitude was so great he was knocked down right away. The earthquake continued for what seemed like a long time. He lay on his stomach, looking around. Everything appeared to dance in front of his eyes. In places, long and wide cracks suddenly appeared in the dry ground. When the earthquake subsided, he could hear a few cries. Wounded. It didn’t make any difference they were all about to die anyway. He looked towards the west. He couldn’t see anything yet. But he knew it was coming, and excitement got hold of him, like he was in for a treat, something special. First, John felt the wind. It smelled salty, just like a sea breeze. But this breeze got stronger and stronger, howling and raising curtains of sand in the distance. And, towering over the sandstorm, a wall darker than the night was advancing towards the east. Although he knew these were his last moments on Earth, John didn’t care anymore. The view was majestic. The wave came closer and closer, cascades of water falling from its foamy crest, then getting swept back under the mountain of liquid, mud and debris. The noise became deafening. Mouth wide open, feet firmly planted on the ground, John looked up at the giant, laughing, extending his hands to meet him. He felt a club hitting him in the stomach, the head, sweeping him off his feet. |
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| Added On: Sat Apr 10 2004 | Hits: 1 |
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| Waiting for the worst |
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| I’ve been standing here now for quite some time. How long for sure, I cannot tell. All that I know is that I grow weary holding back whatever distraught demons wait on the other side of this wall. Their abhorrent tirades have ceased momentarily but it shouldn’t be long before I awake them once more. Still, this is no reason to abandon my cold and stony obstruction. This barrier surely cannot be enough to restrain even the smallest of these beasts, as they grow stronger and more grotesque with every incongruity that is confronted and still I grow weaker as my hope and exhilaration drains and joins my ambition with the worms. All that is left to support this wall is the pity I feel for those who these creatures will assail. Already, I hear your screams. Unfortunately, even my pity stretches thin and the wall knows this. Bits of debris strike me from time to time. Not even the wall understands my struggling to keep it erect. Only time now prevents their unveiling. My god, please don’t let them find a way. |
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| Added On: Mon Oct 6 2003 | Hits: 1 |
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| Tornado |
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| I assure you this is totally fiction. I got the idea from looking at tornado pictures on the web. Although I haven’t experienced a tornado, this is what I imagine it could be like. Enjoy-skinsfan What was supposed to be a routine drive home, would be one of my most terrifying experiences in life. It was 9:00 at night and I was leaving work and heading home. On my way out, I heard the radio announcer come across with a weather bulletin. There was always some kind of bad weather in the area and I figured this one would be no different. Little did I know that this storm would change my life forever. As I headed home, the rains were on and off. The skies were dark and a gust of wind would occasionally catch me off guard. I first started noticing something was different by the traffic flow. Where the streets were usually very busy from evening commute, tonight there was an eerie quiet about them. Soon the winds picked up. I found myself struggling to keep the car on the road. It was swerving this way and that and finally come to rest on the medium. I quickly got out to collect myself, when I heard a roar in the distance. As the winds continued to get stronger, a look around told me that this wasn’t just an ordinary storm. Debris was starting to fly around and my heart was beginning to race. I knew I had to seek shelter, but at the same time I was hypnotized by the vengeful roaring sound down the street. I tried to focus on the noise, but was blinded by the darkness. Soon lightning would light up the sky. A large building was obstructing my view of something-large coming toward me. The crashing of objects and cracking of wood was deafening. A second lightning strike would expose my worst fear. The building was now spinning rubble, as a large tornado exposed itself. Its size was enormous! It was chewing up all in its path and was staring right at me! I froze in fear, as my hair was standing straight up! My thoughts were shouting in my head, but my body was like rubber. Just as my life passed before my eyes, I felt a tug at my arm. I turned to a homeless man pointing at an open manhole in the street. He frantically tugged at my arm, as debris was buzzing by my head. I started toward the hole, as cars and other large debris were crashing all around. I finally made it to the hole and started down. About the third step, my body went limp from fear and I fell to the bottom. I quickly looked up toward the entrance to see the homeless man struggle to follow. His arms were shaking under the strain of holding on to the ladder, but the power of the tornado was too much. About halfway down, the storms power sucked his body toward the opening and he hit with a bone-breaking thud. He never even had time to scream for help. His body looked as if it was convulsing, as the tornado’s power continued to slam him against the hard concrete. I was horrified as I watched! His body finally gave under the tornado’s strength and he was violently pulled out. My fear was so overwhelming that I just curled into a ball and prayed I wasn’t next. The noise! That horrible, thunderous noise! I laid there shivering in fear for what seemed like hours until finally the tornado passed. I could still hear things crashing around as the concrete above my head started crumbling from the pressure. Soon things were an eerie quiet. As I lay there, the sight of the homeless man ran over and over in my mind. I soon wanted out. When I got back on the street above, I witnessed true devastation. The buildings were now rubble. Trees on top of cars and bodies lay motionless. Tears streamed down my face, as the damage was unexplainable. Why? Why hear? Why now? I still shook from my experience and thought of the lives that were lost. What was once a quiet town, was now unrecognizable caucus. Sirens filled the air, as rescue teams fought through the damage to help any survivors. Voices were calling from the rubble, as paramedics scrambled to free them. The streets were now coming alive with victims much like myself. Some were screaming after there lost loved ones, while others tried to find life through the mountains of wood and steel. As I thought of my own family, I soon felt a blanket over my wet and trembling shoulders. I turned to see the smiling face of a police officer who quickly asked if I was OK. After I assured him I was fine, I then asked him about the possible damage at home. I explained to him where I lived and he told me everything was fine. He told me the tornado touched down a mile passed my house and my family would be fine. I fell to the ground and thanked God. Our lives were spared, but my memories would haunt me forever. |
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| Added On: Wed Jul 21 2004 | Hits: 1 |
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