Would You Rather!
1)
You are supplanted into the consciousness and body of a 45-year old man. You are in a dingy, highwayside motel; there are deep brown water damage stains forming numerous two-dimensional stalactites on the yellow wallpaper. Something neutral is on the television - which is an ancient tube thing by a brand you faintly recognize, and makes you feel so damn old - but the volume is far too loud. You are having one of those nights where you aren’t sure whether you’re going to make it or not. You remind yourself that you’ve had those nights before, but the reassurance is trumped by the assertive belief that you’ve never had a night this bad. Your wife - your third - has left you. There was an explanation, and it was a rude one. You were doing the absolute best that you could to make it work and to please her, and she left you anyhow, taking your ‘87 Ford Tempo and your only friend, the one that you believed to be your only friend, with her. You can feel parts of your leg, isolated in small areas from your calf to your ass, beginning to fall asleep, and you wonder how you will sleep tonight on a mattress that disagrees so gravely with the human body - if you would have even slept on a comfortable bed. With your right hand, you fondle a cigarette burn on the blanket, and only glance at it long enough to see one discolouration before you look away. You have two sons, and neither of them will return your calls; you could use the money that you’ve lent to each of them, because you can’t bear the thought of returning home to collect your wallet, which, idiotically, was left at your apartment in your haste to run away. You wonder how you will eat in the morning, and, your view broadening, you wonder how you will have clean clothes in two days. You shove your hand in your pocket and retrieve a crumpled $10 bill, and remind yourself, 45 years old, unemployed, single - ‘this is all I have left. I am 45 years old.’
OR
2)
Watch one episode of “Modern Family”
