The news of the day, meanwhile, was being written in a ribbon of lights on a building to Billy's back. The window reflected the news. It was about power and sports and anger and death. So it goes.
Billy went into the bookstore.
Things really don't change all that much. I have been to Times Square. I've looked into the window of a tawdry bookstore there, probably saw the same stuff that Billy Pilgrim saw, minus the four Kilgore Trout paperbacks. And I've seen the news in lights, and that news was all about power and sports and anger and death. So it goes.
I'd like to believe that the world has somehow changed since Vonnegut envisioned Billy Pilgrim in Times Square back in the 1960s. Unfortunately, things haven't gotten better. They may have shooed away the hookers and forced the adult bookstores to close, but Times Square is pretty much the same. So is the world.
Today, I saw a close friend that I haven't seen in a couple years. She looked happy, healthy. Unfortunately, my friend just learned that she has breast cancer. In the next couple weeks, she's going to be getting bilateral mastectomies and reconstructive surgery. Then she starts rounds of chemo.
I hugged my friend this afternoon. Hard. Asked her if there was anything I could do, even though I knew there wasn't. She is a fighter and has been her whole life. I know that she's going to beat this disease. The thing she seemed most upset about was the fact that she had to postpone starting her college nursing program.
In a world that Kurt Vonnegut sees speckled with soot and fly shit, there are stories of hope and survival. Yes, the world is still full of power and sports and anger and death, but my friend reminded me today that I don't have to give in to all that. I can choose light instead of darkness.
So, this afternoon, Saint Marty is thankful for his friend, who is a sun in a world filled with shadows.
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