It is beautiful. The trail was never going to end. Or at least I wasn't going to make it to the end. I won't live forever. I will die before we reach the end of the trail. We'd been traveling for three years. By all calculations it will take another four to five years. I realized that as I was digging through the journals from the explorers before us. I realized that the rest all knew that, they just didn't want to tell me. To tell me that what I had fought for wasn't ever going to be mine.
But...
Days like this embolden me
To comment on the quality
Of 6ms's frustrating UI.
The problems with the pagination
Require no imagination
To fix, and also I must wonder why
Some days I cannot find a prompt
(Or anything that rhymes with prompt)
And my reliance on the site is waning.
Don't get me wrong, I'm here to stay
Or else I'd surely go away
But sometimes it can be quite aggravating.
No prompt today. I'm at a loss. The alarm has gone off as usual, but nothing in the display to tell me what to do, where to go or even what to wear. I'll stay here, in the warm cushion of my sleeper unit. It will reboot soon.
But it hasn't. Nothing has happened. No sounds, no whirring, no coffee. What should I do?
I slide my feet over the side. Naked I search for something to cover my modesty. The blinds stay shut, but I peek through and see no light. No sun. No rain. No people.
I look...
"I'm in love with a robot!" "Oh, Barbie, congratulations!" Woody exclaimed, "but what happened to Ken?"
You see, Ken just didn't cut it anymore. Barbie had loved him for so long despite his all-polyester wardrobe, but recently she discovered that he had the hots for Bo Peep.
"What's his name?" asked Mrs. Potato Head. "Alfie, Alfie the spelling robot!" Barbie screamed. "I'm in love and I don't care who knows it!" "Awww," sighed Slink, "another romance in Andy's room."
"Have ya kissed em yet, Barb?"
"Yes, Skipper, I have."
"Awwww." said
She gritted her teeth and walked slowly down the hall to the room where he was sitting. She'd have prefered the electric chair. Facing him would be one of the hardest things she'd ever done. She walked into the room and he looked up from the book he was reading, a pleasant smile and kind eyes.
"Hey sweetheart."
"Honey, I have something to tell you." She could feel the tention in her chest growing as she spoke. Her words were slow, measured, and careful.
"Yeah?" The question was so innocent, so naive. He had no idea what she was about...
Katie just loved taking walks downtown. It was such a nice way to get some fresh air. What she didn't like where the people she would meet while walking downtown, so as a general rule she kept to herself.
This particual Saturday morning didn't go that way.
As usual, Katie took her little poodle out for a nice stroll. Her poodle seemed to favor a tree, not to far away from a pay phone.
"A pay phone?" Katie chuckled to herself. "Talk about an outdated object."
As if on cue, the pay phone decided to ring. It startled Katie, and...
Millions. Well, it seemed like millions anyway. Millions of girls in colorful ball gowns crowded into the auditorium. Millions, and I could only choose one. They all stood in silence waiting for me. I looked over my shoulder at my smiling parents sitting on their thrones. I took a deep breath and got ready to make my announcement.
"Friends, I thank you all for coming to witness the announcement as to which of you will be my bride." I scanned the sea of young women in front of me. "That woman is..." I stop short. A girl in a white...
I see his face in my mind's eye and feel my chest being lit on fire. It's not fair. Everything is so perfect when I'm with him, but I always have to wake up and come back to the cold reality that he is only the
Man of my Dreams.
I squeeze my eyes shut and try to make his image disappear from where it has burned onto the backs of my eyelids, forming each time I close my eyes again. I feel like screaming at the unfairness of it all until I have no voice left for anything but...
Too saccharine. Too weepy. No dice.
With tears running down my cheeks, my hand on top of hers she looked up at me and said, "Do you know what we are? We're the friends who became sisters." I smiled at her and laughed a little. I felt like my heart was expanding in that moment and ready to burst with all the joy I felt and I didn't try to stop it. "Sisters." I geuss the old saying is true, then: Friends are family you chose for yourself.