The Day the Sun Decided to Stay in Bed
Sprung into newness, carried forth in time, a garnished novelty, another year, another month, another day, another hour…I watch the minutes roll by wondering why the future should array itself in dreary dullness, and why the wide-mouthed dawn aches.
I do not know why everywhere I look I see crumbling effigies of failure. Dust and shadows and the cobwebs of twilight cringe and cram into corners of daytime’s perpetual dreams.
To me, the sun has always been the most static, visible source of inspiration and example. Everyday, just before the sun climbs far above the stratosphere, does he ever think to himself, “Today, I will not rise. I will stay in bed. Half the earth cannot even see me due to those idiot clouds. And what’s the use? The people down below will still rob, cheat, and kill…doing their crimes and running wild through the streets”?
But no, how consistent is this sun. Not only does he rise but he also rises very dependably on the dot.
During my short sojourn down in Mexico last spring, I saw this horribly awful movie called, “A Day without a Mexican”. It was supposed to show how much we’d be at a loss if one day in the U.S. all the Mexicans, whether with green cards or not, just up and vanished. How our economy as we know it would just halt.
But what if, and this is a gargantuan shift, what if instead of Mexicans not showing up, the sun, that sultry, fire-marble star decided to sleep in and not get up one morning?
I think that it would make one great children’s book entitled, “The Day the Sun Decided to Stay in Bed.” I even have a visualization of the illustrations that I could draw for this book. A picture of the sun lying in bed grasping his pillow in reluctance with striped pajamas and most importantly an eye mask still on. And then there would be a shattered alarm clock that Mr. Sun had ripped out of the wall and broken beside his dresser.
The people of the earth would hurry and scurry about the continents and islands as if the prophecies of Chicken Little or the Apocalypse was set loose. Except, of course, those dutiful servants of counting sheep, who also had decided to stay in bed that same coincidental day that our sun had selected as a vacation in bed sheets.
But say about 10:30 or so, our magnificent sun decided to still remain in bed, but this time with the dainty luxury of the breakfast tray placed delicately upon his lap as he yawns and stuffs his open-furnaced mouth with a cinnamon roll. And perhaps, in one faint gripping moment, staring at the particular shape of the egg glowing radiantly on his plate, the way the cooked yoke is so round, and yellow and the way its eggy gloriousness seems to spill over into his bacon and biscuits, it reminds him of something and he exclaims,
“Oh no! What the heck have I done!” But this realization is followed by a 2nd thought, and with a shrug and a sheepish grin, he sighs, “Oh well. Too late now.” And continues eating and places the tray on the floor and pulls out a large book of Balzac and begins reading.
All the while back on earth, the masses of people have gone topsy-turvy. Some going absolutely out of their minds, and some finally coming to their senses. Wars would probably wage in the most beautiful suburban cities of peace between people who used to be neighbors. But at the same time, the rough patches of battles and bloodshed would witness barbed-wire enemies hugging and crying together, their dropped weapons laying in the fields. All this just because the sun was a few hours late getting on the ball this morning.
About 3:00 the now casually inclined Mr. Sun walks out his front door and down the street in a hoody and sweatpants, quite the contrast from his 3-piece suit, briefcase, and horribly rushed black coffee. I could illustrate a picture of this as well….in the Before/After pictorial comparison. The vast difference being the leisurely stroll of the sun going to work at 3:00 in the afternoon, kicking a soda can, singing a song to himself, and bearing his golden locks of fire more tousled about than entire geological eras have ever seen.
THE END
And now if I could just find a publisher who believes in this idea almost as much as I do. I could place this pinch of craziness in print and in color and no one would think that I was smoking something with the story that I just wrote.
THE REAL END
And I should probably also mention that nothing gets rid of the blues more than turning some absurd predicament into an idea for a children's book.
THE ABSOLUTE HONEST TO GOODNESS "THE END"
I do not know why everywhere I look I see crumbling effigies of failure. Dust and shadows and the cobwebs of twilight cringe and cram into corners of daytime’s perpetual dreams.
To me, the sun has always been the most static, visible source of inspiration and example. Everyday, just before the sun climbs far above the stratosphere, does he ever think to himself, “Today, I will not rise. I will stay in bed. Half the earth cannot even see me due to those idiot clouds. And what’s the use? The people down below will still rob, cheat, and kill…doing their crimes and running wild through the streets”?
But no, how consistent is this sun. Not only does he rise but he also rises very dependably on the dot.
During my short sojourn down in Mexico last spring, I saw this horribly awful movie called, “A Day without a Mexican”. It was supposed to show how much we’d be at a loss if one day in the U.S. all the Mexicans, whether with green cards or not, just up and vanished. How our economy as we know it would just halt.
But what if, and this is a gargantuan shift, what if instead of Mexicans not showing up, the sun, that sultry, fire-marble star decided to sleep in and not get up one morning?
I think that it would make one great children’s book entitled, “The Day the Sun Decided to Stay in Bed.” I even have a visualization of the illustrations that I could draw for this book. A picture of the sun lying in bed grasping his pillow in reluctance with striped pajamas and most importantly an eye mask still on. And then there would be a shattered alarm clock that Mr. Sun had ripped out of the wall and broken beside his dresser.
The people of the earth would hurry and scurry about the continents and islands as if the prophecies of Chicken Little or the Apocalypse was set loose. Except, of course, those dutiful servants of counting sheep, who also had decided to stay in bed that same coincidental day that our sun had selected as a vacation in bed sheets.
But say about 10:30 or so, our magnificent sun decided to still remain in bed, but this time with the dainty luxury of the breakfast tray placed delicately upon his lap as he yawns and stuffs his open-furnaced mouth with a cinnamon roll. And perhaps, in one faint gripping moment, staring at the particular shape of the egg glowing radiantly on his plate, the way the cooked yoke is so round, and yellow and the way its eggy gloriousness seems to spill over into his bacon and biscuits, it reminds him of something and he exclaims,
“Oh no! What the heck have I done!” But this realization is followed by a 2nd thought, and with a shrug and a sheepish grin, he sighs, “Oh well. Too late now.” And continues eating and places the tray on the floor and pulls out a large book of Balzac and begins reading.
All the while back on earth, the masses of people have gone topsy-turvy. Some going absolutely out of their minds, and some finally coming to their senses. Wars would probably wage in the most beautiful suburban cities of peace between people who used to be neighbors. But at the same time, the rough patches of battles and bloodshed would witness barbed-wire enemies hugging and crying together, their dropped weapons laying in the fields. All this just because the sun was a few hours late getting on the ball this morning.
About 3:00 the now casually inclined Mr. Sun walks out his front door and down the street in a hoody and sweatpants, quite the contrast from his 3-piece suit, briefcase, and horribly rushed black coffee. I could illustrate a picture of this as well….in the Before/After pictorial comparison. The vast difference being the leisurely stroll of the sun going to work at 3:00 in the afternoon, kicking a soda can, singing a song to himself, and bearing his golden locks of fire more tousled about than entire geological eras have ever seen.
THE END
And now if I could just find a publisher who believes in this idea almost as much as I do. I could place this pinch of craziness in print and in color and no one would think that I was smoking something with the story that I just wrote.
THE REAL END
And I should probably also mention that nothing gets rid of the blues more than turning some absurd predicament into an idea for a children's book.
THE ABSOLUTE HONEST TO GOODNESS "THE END"
posted by Brian Harrison | 10:52 PM
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