Article Contributed on: 9/4/2009 1:55:37 PM
It is the future.
My federally mandated A.I. apartment computer, named B.A.R.R.Y., wakes me up promptly at 7 a.m., having determined that my body has received enough rest for optimum metabolic function, at least for a Tuesday. "Good morning, Sean," the synthetic voice croons, as my bed begins to vibrate. "Having calculated the necessary sugars and carbohydrates required for today's scheduled activities, I have already started your breakfast. It is waiting for you in the kitchen block."
"Gee, thanks, B.A.R.R.Y.," I groaned. "What's on the menu?"
"Grain cakes, avocado juice with pulp, and a short bowl of egg yolk."
"Ah. Breakfast of champions."
"Also, I have scanned your brain chemistry, and detected a slight irritability in your mood. I have adjusted your psychotropic dosing levels accordingly."
"What? I'm not irritable!"
"Brain chemistry scans are scientifically infallible, Sean."
"Oh, go to Hell!"
"I have noted this statement, and included it in your bi-monthly Civil Cooperation Inventory. As you know, I am programmed to do this automatically if your emo-rhythms fluctuate beyond the established Normal Response Grid." Then, the computer sighed. "You really need to relax, Sean. Such notations could impact your Wellness Offsets, and you are already paying an increased rate for falling behind on your weekly community service hours."
"I don't care," I sneered, as I zipped up my work-jumper and shuffled to the kitchen. "I'm putting in eleven hours a day at the Solar Panel Factory, just to pay the interest on my Diversity Fees!"
"Excuse me, but you wouldn't have such high Diversity Fees if you chose to sit with someone other than your own kind on the tram once in a while..."
"I ride in with my dad! He works at the plant!"
"I have noted this statement. Your rates would drop expeditiously if every second day on the tram, you'd sit with a person of a different heritage from you, or a trans-gendered female, or possibly a marginalized drug addict. But you don't even try, Sean. You are so afraid."
"Oh, God," I cursed, gnawing on a tasteless grain cake and watching the trams slip by outside my single, square window. "What am I afraid of, B.A.R.R.Y.?"
"Of progress, of course," the computer explained in a gentle voice. "Progress involves change. Change forces us out of the Dark Ages of our comfort zones, and into the shining light of Reform! Now, leaving the Status Quo can be a very scary thing for deeply repressed individuals such as yourself. But it's not your fault, Sean. Government studies indicate that your unrelenting self-hatred is a direct result of Prolonged Cultural Guilt and Religious Conditioning."
"Well, that's a relief," I replied with a hint of sarcasm, which probably cost me an additional seventy Eurocredits on this month's affidavit. "But explain something to me, Oh Great and Powerful Oz: This progress that I'm so frightened of? What, exactly, are we progressing towards?"
"We are progressing towards change," answered B.A.R.R.Y.
"So we can change what?"
"Our progress."
"You're telling me we're progressing towards a change in our progress?"
"No, I am telling you we're progressing towards a change so that we can progressively change our progress in the change we are progressing towards."
"But...that doesn't make any friggin' sense!"
At this, the computer paused, before answering dryly, "It doesn't have to make sense to you, Sean."
And then, B.A.R.R.Y. cackled.
"It doesn't have to make sense to you at all, you simple-minded rube! Like we care what you think! Maaa-ha-ha-ha-haaaa!"
The small, gray apartment started to spin, as I awoke from my nightmare, covered in sweat. I was in my home in Castle Rock, in my neighborhood, in the United States of America, land of the free. A light September's breeze fluttered in the drapes of my bedroom window, and outside, I could hear the sounds of some little kids playing tag. I put on my robe, and found my wife sitting in the living room, eating a bagel with cream cheese and watching the news. His voice through the speakers of the television set was smooth, and gentle, and warm:
"...focusing your life solely on making a buck shows a certain poverty of ambition. It asks too little of yourself. Because it's only when you hitch your wagon to something larger than yourself that you realize your true potential..."
Without a word, I turned around, went back to bed, pulled the covers up over my head, and dreamed that Che Guevara was stuffing bran muffins and granola bars down my throat until I couldn't breathe.
(Note: Please plan to attend the Castle Rock Tea Party, on Saturday, September 12, at Butterfield Park in the Meadows, from 3pm to 5.)