A window into the Future CW@ALS

(please realize I wrote this a a very young age - I hadn't exactly 'tweeked' my skills at this point.)


A WINDOW INTO THE FUTURE 1981@copywrite

by angela * ** ***

I felt my body being crushed by the weight of the last falling tree. How ironic that I die only after the last tree had fallen. Only after my job was complete. It was our job, mine and my 25 man crew, to clear the last remaining woodland area. Being the charge, I had the honor of cutting down the last tree. The last standing tree in our new world. A modern world I almost never saw. A new world I wish I hadn't seen.
As I lay there on the damp, cool ground, waiting for the life to drain from my body, I saw the blanket of darkness falling slowly and gently around me. Only in the center, infinitely far away, was there a break from the complete blackness. There in its center was a glow, a very bright, yet soft glow. It seemed warm and loving.
As I felt the warm blood flow from my body, my will to remain with it left completely. I felt what I thought was myself being lifted, no floating upward toward this warm nucleus of love.
When I became aware once more of my surroundings, I was in a family room. Its decor was odd, the likes of which I had not seen before. Everything was made of Formica and plastic. Of brightly polished medals and stone. It made its own statement in this was, yet it's meaning evaded me. The walls were painted with bright swirling colors. It seemed so drastic next to the hard surfaces that made up the rest of the room.
I seemed to have intruded upon a family gathering. There were two adults, a man and a woman. I assumed them to be the parents of the three young children there with them. The oldest child looked to be about the age of 12 or 13. The other two children, a boy and a girl, looked very much alike in both age and appearance. I guessed them to be nine years old and twins.
The Mother and Father sat on a bench type sofa, a child on each lap, and the oldest in-between. In their hands they held a large book. All were gazing upon it with awe.
The children were asking questions of what these strange objects were as they pointed at what i presumed to be pictures. I moved behind this group to see the objects in question. I saw that they were looking at my old photo album. These were all pictures I had taken over my 40 years.
The woman was explaining to the children that their great-great-great grandfather had taken these pictures. That this was the world as it was when he lived so long ago. The children listened with fascination as the Mother and Father told stories of how the clay was once covered with grass and how trees sprouted from the earth. They marveled at the tales of what was called flowers, like grass but with blooms of color at the top of each blade. Each bloom different, each of a different color.
The children laughed and accused the Father of teasing when he told them of large pools of water that people once played in. That these pools were deeper than people were tall.
I looked about the room again. Everything was so clean, so sterile. Nothing was made of material, or of wood. There were no furry animals about to dirty the floors, no dust settling upon the surfaces or floating in the air.
It took a long moment to realize where I was. I was in the home of my family, a family many generations after my own.
What had become of the world I had know? Of the world I had helped to destroy? What became of the dreams we had for the future?
I turned, moving toward the one window in this room. Only one small window to show my handy work. I turned and I looked out that window. And then I cried.