The world is starting to look like the future in some bad sci-fi movie. With warring nations, revolutions, and extreme weather conditions all over the world, it's easy to be petrified. With the weather and earthquakes, it's simple to see the spinning rock that we know as Earth is changing. And that's the line that much of the world forgets: We are spinning on a rock in deep space. We are lucky the conditions were just right to provide life. How else would be able to get the new iPhone 5 with that trendy new carrying case? Or the NFL package through DIRECTV?
But it's not only the Earth that has been changing. Society has been changed as well. We're living in the times of the Jetsons, my friend, all except the flying cars.
I think about things like this as I stare into my hand, lost in a flashback. Like the Jetsons, we all have little gadgets that resemble something produced at Spacely Sprockets or Cogswell Cogs. We already have moving sidewalks in most airports -- providing a cool ride because you can read the paper like a spy as you move along. We have the Internet that Elroy can sit in front of and do his homework. Futuristic cell phones rule the day. Texting has replaced the spoken word. My thumbs are too big for me to text well, so I don't. I do something else: I call the person!
The equally scary part is the Mad Max-like battles the world fights in so many theaters of war. This leads me to think that we are on the
The threat of nuclear war is as real as child support these days. The Middle East, full of revolution, is as hot as a fat guy after his fourth plate at Old Country Buffet. Hey, I was hungry. Like Nostradamus, I see the struggle for world peace as a bitter fight, but for what I'm not sure. Some think it's going to be a religious war, a crusade proving our God is stronger than theirs. It doesn't really matter much, though. War is war.
But most people forget about this stuff once NBC's Nightly News is over, tuning on another rip off of the CSI program. Not me. I dwell on the state of the planet as if I was responsible for the actions of the free world. Not that I would do a bad job, but I wouldn't be an active president since I have the legs of FDR.
I'm here to tell you it's OK to be scared. Heck, I am, just like a baby without its mom. Be grateful that I'm not in control, but be afraid as well. Who knows what changes lie ahead of us as we careen through space? What will the toys be like in 15 years? Will there be vacuum lifts as if we were all bank deposits, transporting us in that tube thing you see at the bank? You know, the line that nobody likes to get into.
When I was a local disc jockey, a guy would call the station once in a while and tell me the world was spinning too fast. That he went out for a loaf of bread and when he came back it was five years later. I would laugh and humor this old guy like any 27-year-old. But old Harold was right: The world is spinning way too fast, and there is no way off unless you become one of the first to colonize the Moon -- another scary thought. But like George Jetson, I muddle on wishing that Rosie the Maid would zip by with a roast beef sandwich because the news is on the HDTV.
Johnnie Carrier is a freelance writer who hates being right sometimes.
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