It is truly a strange thing to wonder if you will live to see tomorrow. Like, shockingly clarifying in a way, to know what you would do in the hours that you believe might be your last. How you’ll feel.
Let me start again.
It’s about a quarter past eight CET on April 7th, 2026. Earlier today (around 14:00 CET) the goddamned president of the united states said that, by his hand, and I’m going to quote here, “A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back. I don’t want that to happen, but it probably will.” This is from the man who is in charge of one of the world’s largest nuclear arsenals. A man who has repeatedly asked why we don’t consider using nuclear as well as conventional weapons in war. I have full fucking faith that he is incapable of understanding why we don’t want to open that Pandora’s box, no matter how many times and in how many ways it is explained to him.
So, the man at the helm of one of the largest militaries on earth may well plunge us into a global nuclear conflict at 20:00 eastern time US. 2:00 am for me. I mean, he might not, right? He’s very mercurial. However, he’s also shown a remarkable lack of restraint in just… just his whole damn life, so anyone saying it’s a certainty he won’t set off a chain of events that will kill most of us outright and doom the rest to envy the dead is lying to themselves.
So, like I was saying, it’s a strange thing to wonder if you’ll see tomorrow. “None of us knows the day or the hour”, that’s what it says in the gospel of Matthew. That was about the rapture and end of days, but I think it’s equally true for an individual life. None of us know how much longer we have. Some of us die not knowing. The rest of us are either fortunate or unfortunate enough to know, right before the end.
Still, the day to day uncertainty isn’t this. Every day it’s true I might have an aneurysm taking a shit. Someone might lose control of their car and hit me as I walk to work. I could choke to death eating my breakfast alone in my apartment. Those are deaths of surprise, with no chance for reaction.
Tonight, at 2:00 am is a planned event. We might all go, and from the moment you heard that asshole say something profoundly dumb up until about 2 or 3 hours past the deadline, you get to wonder if these moments are your last. If you accept that framing, then you get to know what you’d do with your last hours here on earth in this strange liminal moment. Maybe you’ll have that to reflect back on in your old age. Maybe you won’t.
I see a lot of people yelling on the internet. People helpless to actually do anything about it, but that is the noise they can make. I get it. I’m terrified too, and anger is a pretty normal outlet for terror. I mean, to be honest with you, I’m angry too. About the situation, how it came to be, and that we’ve given power to assholes like this. I wish I’d understood the stakes younger. I wish I’d realized voting wasn’t enough.
I spent earlier today trying to work. Tomorrow might come. You never know, right? And if it does, well I’ll be in better stead for the work I did this morning. That said, my job is part of my identity, and I chose to engage with the scientist today. Being a researcher makes me happy. I like being valued for my thoughts, and if I have to die, tonight or at any other time, I don’t think I’ll ever regret the hours I spent in thought about math, and algorithms, and the nature of problem solving. Even if all of it were wiped away, I built meaning in myself, and it pleased me to do so.
Eventually though, that became too much, and I too took to the internet. Not to yell, just to remind people I think fondly of that maybe this is what they have. That might have been dickishly alarmist, but I don’t think so. I wasn’t calling for a Purge or even looting. I said “this is the most ‘I should call her’ moment that ever has been and might ever be. Eat your dessert first friends.” I don’t think that’s wrong or irresponsible. I think that’s sound advice in many situations. People put off indulgences, like friendship and lust and leisure, far too often in pursuit of productivity or longevity. What good is an extremely long life if not spent in the pursuit of joy and love for ourselves or others? I guess since I’m making bold statements with no expectation of having to back them up, the answer is none.
In that spirit, I thought about sending some indiscreet discord messages, but they felt selfish. I don’t think what I could express would help those people feel better in what might be our last hours. Maybe it’ll absolve me to write it here, and if at 2:04 this morning I wake up to a call letting me know the missiles are flying, I can copy and paste a couple DMs that will never get read.
To the one my wife refers to as ‘Basement Lesbian’: I have always thought you were a god damned delight. Smoking hot, fun to be around, just the whole thing. I dig your style, especially the sword earrings, and I think back on the few times we had a real full conversation together fondly. Also the first time I saw you at home, in your element, when I was really early in my transition, I saw you bopping around without a bra and I still remember exactly what I thought — I hope my tits are as nice as hers someday. I think you should know that. Also, I’m really glad you ended up with my friend; he’s better for knowing you.
And to another lovely woman who will no doubt know exactly who she is: When we went out to karaoke, and I drove us all home, did I misread that? Did you lean over the console and nearly kiss me at the end of the night? For shame. I’m a married woman! — Nah, not really though. I mean about the shame. I wish you had. I wanted you to, and it would have been a fucking disaster for everyone involved, but I still wish you had. And if that wasn’t what that was? Well tough titty. I wanted to be wanted, and I wanted to be wanted by you, and I would have survived all the drama that came with that just to fucking know what that was like for one ill advised moment on a Friday night. In what may well be my last hours, some of my thoughts are on you. Does that count as love? Better answer fast.
And to all of you, your love breaks my heart. I hope all of you know exactly how any one of you talks about the rest when they’re not in the room. And when you’re together, you should know that the unabashed affection for one another… well it’s honestly complicated for me. It’s like watching young love as an old woman. Heartwarming, but bittersweet. That’s not your fault though. That’s on me.
Anyway, I opted against my ill-advised DMs, but since honesty had already joined the chat, I decided to call some close friends. My groomsmen, actually. Still a weird thing for me to think about. But I called them, and I told them I loved them. That I missed them. That their friendship had made life less scary and more good over the years, even when we fought. I told them that was true even in the gaps where I wasn’t saying it, and they told me they loved me too.
And then? Then I bitched about my wife to them. The woman who hasn’t called me. Who won’t. The woman who I know loves me, but will not spare me a thought, or at least, not the thoughts I need. Twenty years of a relationship this March. Not quite half my life, but only off by a year. 17 years of marriage in August, provided we live to see the 9th, and, you know, this essay doesn’t end in divorce. A marriage, a doctorate, two houses, five jobs, one birth behind us, and you know what I know for certain? I’m not on her mind, not in the ways that I want to be, in this moment. There are others more distraught. Our daughter needs comfort. So do her friends. Her mother’s right there too, and she’ll need consoling. Somewhere along the line, I convinced myself that was ok. That one day she would see the cost of letting me eat last, and until then, I could eke out what affection I needed around the corners. If I could talk to her now, she’d tell me I was the one who chose to eat last. She’d be right of course, I did. She let me.
I can’t though. It’s 21:00 CET, T-5 hours, and we can’t talk. She’s on her last Easter vacation at home. With our daughter. With her mother. I can’t get her support right now, if she even has signal to take the call. That isn’t because she doesn’t love me though. She does, just not how I want or need to be loved. Even if I could make the call, even if she took it, I’m not sure I could reach for what I need and she’d never offer.
Ain’t that a bitch?
We both want each other, but after two decades and two near-brushes with death, or way more if we count some of the worst depressive episodes, I can admit that our desire to love one another isn’t enough to build the sort of relationship either of us deserves. We can love one another, deeply even, but that doesn’t make us compatible. We can be two of the most capable people in the world, able to bring great force of will to bear on nearly any task. Any task save that of the work of being in love with one another. We can tolerate nearly any indignity, save that of confronting one another where effort or intent fall short. That’s not fair, but when is life?
No one knows what the future holds, least of all me. I hope I don’t spend one more day with things left unsaid. I hope I don’t spend one more day sitting with unmet needs. I hope I don’t spend one more day wasting time on things that don’t really matter. I hope I wake up tomorrow. And when I do, I hope I remember what I learned about myself in those last few hours on earth.