Meaningless Nothing

It’s difficult to say why, as is so often the case. For some reason the toughest question to answer is often why, and to explain why that is the case would be even more difficult to answer than the first question. Suffice it to say that answering why is a never ending quest that can never really stop.

So, simply enough, he did. Why he did it was not a factor. Perhaps he was curious or perhaps he wanted to know if he could, but on the night of September 4^th he climbed over the fence of Englewood Securities Company.

At first nothing happened. He jumped down from the fence, nevermind what type or what height it was, it was and is of little importance. He observed his surroundings and continued walking through the grassy field leading up to the main building. Unknown to him his presence had triggered a great deal of alarm within the confines Englewood Securities. A sensor had recorded the shake in the fence, and another recorded his jump onto the grass. A security unit was immediately dispatched by the head of security and silent alarms rang silently, as they like to do.

He didn’t know this however. He kept walking closer and closer to the building. He was not without thought, far from it. He thought the grassy field was appealing and soft. He thought that more people should come here at night. He thought, and still thinks, that it was nice to go someplace he had never been before. It was peaceful.

Far differing from his thoughts were those of the security officers, who now saw him in the distance and approached him. Before he could turn his head to greet the people they had tackled him and handcuffed him. They took him to a room within the building and once again he thought it interesting to be in another place he had not been before. The security interrogators tried multiple times to ask him why he had climbed the fence and if he realized he was trespassing. Yet, all he could reply with was because the grass was on the other side of the fence, and that he didn’t know what trespassing meant. He knew the dictionary definition of course, but it meant nothing.

After an hour of frustration they saw he had done no harm and lead him to the gates of the fence. They told him not to do it again, a thing that brought great puzzlement to him. He could not see why they would not want people to be there, but he assured them he wouldn’t for now he knew what was past the fence.

A various amount of days passed with seemingly no important events. He meandered through the town, existing, as people like to do. A Friday came and he went to the local football game. He had been on the field many times before, but this night it was different. Lined with lines and covered with colorful jerseys brilliantly lit by brilliant lights, it was especially intriguing. Most decadent of all was the home team’s end zone whose colored grass gathered the attention of him. He had never stepped on colored grass and it seemed that it would be much more different from the green variety.

So, in the fashion he did so many things in his life, he walked out onto the field and stepped into the grass. It felt funny to him. It was a little bit crisp, moist, and at the same time extremely soft. He enjoyed it so he sat down, just like anyone does when they find a soft place.

But, unbeknownst to him, the colorful jerseys were in the vicinity and many a people became angry at him stepping across the lines. They shouted, screamed, and eventually lifted him up and placed him outside of the stadium. All the while he told them they should sit down on the colored grass. He thought everyone would like it.

He saw that they were frustrated with him and he apologized for frustrating them. He didn’t think he had done anything wrong, but he didn’t like to make people angry nonetheless.

They said he could sit on the grass the next day and he came back then. He didn’t see why time would make any difference, for the grass wasn’t going anywhere fast, might as well sit there while it’s nice and cool at night.

Things got to normal again pretty soon, that is to say there were no fences or colored grass, and he kept on breathing, sleeping, eating and a number of other unimportant ing’s. Soon enough though, another mentionable occurrence happened by. It was simply in his nature to get involved in things of these sorts. Some bit of his personality clashed with the ambient environment that permeated through his every week existence.

And as pattern might imply, it happened again. He was driving (a task he no longer performs for what may be obvious reasons) during the night when he approached a red light. He had been instructed to always stop at these lights. No one ever told him why but he reasoned there was probably a why associated with it. Usually he stopped because everyone in his lane would do so. This time, however, there was no one in the lane. It was late at night and he stopped, but couldn’t see any reason to wait. He thought why wait when he could go home.

So, as would be expected he proceeded innocently home. But, shortly afterward, as would also be expected, flashing lights illuminated and a roadside conference ensued.

The commander of the flashing lights vehicle asked him why he had done it and he replied why not. It was just a light of red after all, what could it possibly mean. The commander countered that it meant to stop but this was all lost on him. To him, it was just a light, a pretty light, but just a light nonetheless.

Occurrences like this continued on in his life until he decided he would live in a cabin where he wouldn’t make the people so frustrated. Things worked out for both parties involved, but still many people ask why he did these things. To this, there is an answer, there is a why, although it may better be explained in the way that he thought.

For him, all the things he did were reduced to their simplest elements. He viewed the three occurrences as if looking down on himself from an orbiting satellite or fixed viewpoint directly overhead. That is, take a map and zoom out until the person is gone and replaced with a simple red cross representing his location. From this view, all he did was move a few yards over a fence, 20 yards into some grass, and 30 yards across an intersection, a few degrees on a map. This is how he viewed his life.

The things the other people saw like the sensors, the red light, the jerseys, were transparent to his motives. The ideas the fence, lines, and lights meant to others meant as much to him as they do to the chicken crossing the road. For him it was more a case of why not than why, more existence than meaning.

So he lived on like that. Existing, observing, looking, never seeing things beyond what they were because, in the end, that’s all that they are.