Six Hundred or Three

James wrote feverishly one exquisite word after another, words chiseled in pure, unadulterated English -- ready to be delivered to the nameless jury that was supposed to decide his fate. Thirty- three so far. Five hundred and sixty-seven to go. It had to be completed in three minutes or six hundred words -- a pretty extreme "tour de force" for such a short existence. In three minutes one had to be born, pass through infancy, childhood, adolescence, and finally enter adulthood and create a masterpiece -- one shot to attain eternity or disappear into nothingness. All this based on a brief glance at a gloomy world through a murky glass, maybe an opened newspaper on a red plastic laminated table (too far away to be legible), inside an anonymous cafeteria, or more likely a bar, judging by the letters reflected in the window on a nondescript street. One hundred and fifty- eight already and only four hundred and forty- two words to live by - not counting the ones already mentioned. Life feels so damned short! James made another fruitless attempt to see what was in the newspaper. A man moving away on the other side of the glass leaves him as clueless as everything else in this dismal picture. Who was he? Where was he heading? What was in his bag? Pointless questions. The pedestrian, in transit, obstructed the only car in the street. Nothing was revealed but the beam of a front light and... wait a minute – ha! That would be about one- third of one’s existence. (OK, bad joke.) There is another barely visible silhouette on the other side of the street. Another spot of red. It's no use! How on earth can one make sense of this miserable existence? How can one even determine what is on which side of the glass? Three hundred and thirty- three and counting.

James was already in full mid-life crisis. He was half way through his life and had nothing to show, except for a bunch of words. It is horrible to know precisely your life expectancy. And on top of that to be wholly original, like: “may not be copied from any other source; not previously broadcast or otherwise distributed or disseminated in any media or format; may not be in the public domain; may not be in violation of or conflict with the trademark, copyright, rights of privacy, rights of publicity or any other rights, of any kind or nature, of any other person or entity; and may not include any language or other content that is indecent, inappropriate, morally objectionable or otherwise unfit for dissemination or broadcast, as determined by the SPONSOR in its sole discretion.” Who the hell is this SPONSOR anyway, and why is he deciding everything about one’s life? Rules, rules, bloody rules! Four hundred and ninety- two - one hundred and eight to go. This is really stupid! I mean counting one’s moments. Such a waste! So not a quality of life thing. What a word. LIFE. . . .Let’s see: “life OE. līf. corr. to OS. līf life, person (Du. lijf body), OHG. līb life (G. leib body), ON. līf life, body :- Gmc. *līƀam(-az).”Beautiful! But such a short one! Maybe one could live longer by experiencing longer words, like

“

Methionylthreonylthreonylglutaminylarginyl...isoleucine"-- 189,819 letters. It’s the largest known protein. Could this be what they mean when they say living in the moment? It would be a 600- page book! A long and boring one. Nah! I'll stick with life -- to the last drop. 600 words. Period.