facing a dying nation

facing a dying nation

fiction
edward w pritchard


"Hair, let the sunshine" in the Broadway play was a sort of anthem for the baby boomers, at least it was for a while then in 1969 when Treat Williams marching in the Broadway play dressed as a soldier in an endless row of Men in green military uniform sang about "facing a dying nation" and the real possibility of dying before your allotted time in the Vietnam War seemed pressing, absurd and senseless. Now a half century later 75 million baby boomers face the certainly of dying in the next 30 years. That's  a quarter of the US population who will be passed on within moderate period of time.

Tonight the Moon is nearly full and the red planet Mars is near the Moon in the sky. One feels looking up at the Moon and Mars that one has witnessed the two Heavenly bodies before a few hundred life times ago. The Moon going to full in the night sky is one of those racial memories that is just out of the reach of our collective recollection.

Our sojourn on Earth is so brief. It's over before we become fully oriented in Time and space.

Clutch your possessions tightly to your side tonight under the nearly full Moon. What do you believe in and where did your allotted Time go?