March of The Forgotten Astray (Rough Draft)

March of the forgotten astray

Society Leads us astray and then forgets us. We follow the merry tune, to our merry fates. We squander our lives away with the struggles of men who have long since turned to dust, and we ourselves fall victim to the tides of their toil. It is not that human beings are false, or fake. Instead the real issue is that our environment breads personalities in which fallacy is the substantiated aspect of ones existence. The act has become the only role the actor can play. We are all but characters in life’s play, unfortunately our roles are all the same and we are no good at our own parts.

The engine puttered away. The gentle hum slowly faded, but when it began to idly stop, it would gently roar back to full and begin the relaxing decline over again. Little clings and clangs came from within the car that made (Him) nervous about the engines health.

He passed the time staring at the clock and inching forward every other minute. Traffic wasn’t so bad, it gave him a chance to let his mind explore foreign vibrations. Just as the car engine had, he found himself idling in the silence of his skull and then roaring forward into expanses not yet explored or left fallow for longer than needed. Like a tree he branched from topic to topic, scenario to scenario. He played out inevitable conversations to come at the awaiting reception. He remembered past romances and those that could barely be called romances. Eventually he exhausted the apparent hypothtical circumstances and came to realizing that he was still not very close to the venue. Like mice stuck in a maze, his eyes meandered at varying speed up and down the long street, flickering along the avenue. Pausing shortly to examine seemingly interesting details, they scanned the far side walk, and then across the causeway and eventually came slowly to a rest upon a fascinating occurrence.

To the right of his car, which sat rumbling in stillness just one lane from the right, upon the side walk was a stream of people. Traveling solitarily, and sometimes in groups of twos, but rarely in three or more was a never-ending cascade of people. As far down the street as he could see, the sidewalk had scattered upon it this loosely knit line of middle aged persons. On a busy street this may seem normal, however this was a relatively quiet road for pedestrians, normally reserved to the snail cars during rush hour, and roughly an empty street by night. However there were no attractions or stores that could possible muster enough popularity to draw such a crowd at this hour.

There was no way these people were shoppers, they looked on the verge of depression, holding back whatever emotions they had from physical manifestation. Some of them walked calmly, though intently and cautiously. Others walked rigidly with their hand awkwardly astray, hands far removed from their sides or pockets.

(Blank) was curious. As such of life’s anomalies often perplexed him, they rarely went unexplained. A polite honk from the car behind him indicated that whatever had been blocking traffic had been mended and now the boulevard was once again alive.

His luke warm motor revived as well with a touch of the pedal and off he went, his mind still hung in the air behind, staring at those who walk toward nothing, who came from nowhere, who travel in small groups if not alone, and walk nervously void of emotion.

Arriving at the baptism reception, (blanks) thoughts darted constantly back to his wanderers and their elusive purpose. He decided he needed help, which was a brash step for he was used to figuring everything out on his own. He approached Marilynn Westbrook, who to his knowledge lived very close to Saltair street.

“Excuse me”

Marilynn was engrossed with her current discussion. Although (blank) could not clearly make out all the words clearly, he decided to be polite and wait for her to finish. Marilynn raved on,

“don’t you see it’s not about the shoes, it’s the sock” muttering the last bit softly and in the reverend’s ear as if to tell a mind numbing secret. “the shoe can only do so much, the sock is the culprit for back pain. One need proper cushioning when selecting a sock”

(Blank) had heard about enough and couldn’t possible allow this to continue. He glanced at the reverend who he expected asleep, but was in fact wide awake and appearing fairly interested in the dynamics of sock to shoe responsibly.

“Excuse me” he utter slightly louder this time.

“Well hello (blank) I didn’t see you at the reception, where have you been?”

“You know traffic in the city”

“Aw yes of course, what can I do for you”

“I was wondering if you could solve a mystery which has been puzzling me for some time now”

“Yes, of course, I’ll try, what is it”

“Today around sevenish while I was on my way here, sitting in traffic, I noticed a long trail of people funneling toward something near saltair street”

“Oh well that’s the double A meetings”

“Double A?”

“You know, Alcoholics Anonymous”

“Oh”

“Yes they all have a large meeting about twice a month, poor souls”

“How do you mean, aren’t they relatively cured and on the right track now that they are in the program?”

“Well yes, but they’ve been so unfortunate in the path of life, they’ve all made such terrible choices to end up there”