Day 1
Today was supposed to not happen. We are all not dead! Amazing! What did the Mayans know! Better look outside the window and check, for what, aliens? Submerged coastline? Triffids?
All I see is the postman. He drops the mail in my mailbox without any scaly tongue doing the work of his hands. Time to engage plan B – return to life as usual.
Day 2
Triffids have a penchant for humans with a 70's flavour.Things are not the same after all. After I taught my yoga class, I stopped by the bank. My balance was 0 ! Either I am 25 again or something even stranger is afoot. I inquire with the tellers who appear to be in the throws of a collective heart attack. They inform me that all accounts are zeroed. It can only be the work of those aliens that everybody is talking about. Invisible megalomaniac aliens, apparently. Shame. I always felt they would be more like hipster aliens. Why else would they come here? Earth would be the singular retro stop for the whole universe, mahn.
Day 3
It's hilarious. It's insane. I'm not even going to take my briefcase!Word is that the monetary system of the world has disappeared. Just like that! It’s mayhem in big cities. People are walking more and getting fresh air, for god’s sake. The humanity! Some people are leaving their homes in search of good soil and free yoga classes.
Day 4
Sold! To the pretty girl in pinkCities are empty. Everyone seems to own a bicycle all of a sudden. I ride out of the city towards smaller towns. They have already created their own currency – they call it the warm, sincere embrace. That’s a social experiment if ever there was one. Since the human race is going through the biggest change since yoga became sexy, a hug can be most reassuring. I walk past a guy trying to auction his mansion. The highest bidder would be wiser to just marry him, because their embrace to the value of his property will go on for so long, they’ll need to lie down.
Day 5
Anarchy! The dancing and lightness of being - its getting out of control!Physical-embrace-as-currency is spreading like wildfire, though everybody seems to have dropped the idea of counting them or negotiating a quantity in exchange for products. It’s happening all very naturally. There are exchanges for food, poetry readings, sculptures, spontaneous dances, counselling, meditation guidance, and gardening. Is the world becoming happier? Definitely hippier – and I'm not just throwing on a New Zealand accent and saying happier.
Not sad I missed the 70’s anymore. This is better!
Day 6
Returned to the city to see it abandoned. Not even homeless people have stuck around. I think they’ve been absorbed by this new paradigm of existence. Strangely, the internet still works if one uses satellite, but most of the sites are not moving. Their owners are probably too busy constructing tepees for their families. I wonder what’s happened to the airline industry.
Day 7
No work after sun-down. Work-life balance? Here it is!I checked out the airlines. Few are operating – the ones that had already converted to using biofuel before the old world ended. They tell me that no one has booked flights since the money disappeared. The only people flying are those using the return portion of their ticket.
Community camp fires, it’s vegetarian all the way. Having to kill our food turns the whole idea of craving a juicy steak on its head. Hooray! Or should I say, Mooo!
Day 8
They came. They saw. They cried.I see Mad Max driving his beat-up car down the road, loaded with bald, scarred men with guns - big guns. Something strange about the sight of him though. The scary men who ride on the back of his car are in an intimate embrace (they must be buying something), and Max looks sad. He’s obviously waited years for this day to come, and I know that he didn’t imagine it would be like this. Aw, no anarchy for Max.
Day 9
A lot more people are meditating and exercising this morning. People everywhere are busy, creative-busy.
This afternoon a strange light show descends from the sky. A peculiar yellow cloud throws out beams of light. Hundreds of them track along the ground.
I ride my bike to where I think the lights touch down, and a crowd of people are already there gazing at these beautiful images impressed upon the field. I am there for maybe ten minutes when little translucent alien life forms walk out of the field; five of them. They seem bored by us just standing there, staring. A spacecraft is parked right next to us but we don't see it. They get in and leave. People have speculated the existence of aliens for hundreds of years and this was the encounter. Totally overrated!
Day 10
Peposterous that people can survive without my leadership!The Mayor of the city comes by, stands on a box and makes a speech assuring us that he will lead us through this devil-inspired Armageddon. No one listens. Then, a man in a hot pink dress stands up on the same box and shouts, “Who wants to make yarn?” This draws a flurry of activity. Priorities are different now. Life is good. We used to fear the end of the world. I fear going back.