What I did write last friday was a speech.
I’m not much of a talker, never have been, never will be, but I have been a storyteller. I’m not good at motivating people, doesn’t run in my family, but I’m here to try and do it today. We are all alone, there is no one out there who is going to save us, no police, no army, no nothing, its just us, and I want all of you to come to realize that. We do not have anyone coming. No one. But we don’t need them, we have each other. There are how many, twelve, fifteen of us, all banded together, for near fifteen weeks we’ve managed to come together and survive, and not just surive, grow, and I know each one of you has felt it and you can’t deny it. I’m just hoping this means something to you.
Fourteen weeks ago the dead rose up and inherited the Earth. We all know that, that’s why we are stuck where we are. I don’t have any kind words for you about this, because it was harsh, and hit fast, and there was nothing anybody could have done to change it. I don’t have a reason for you, I don’t know if its plague or parasite, or something else altogether. It could be the wrath of God for all I care. All I know is that it came quick, it hit hard, and it tore the goddamn world apart. Its that reason we are where we are. It’s the reason we’ve been stuck together for the last fourteen weeks. We’ve been barricaded inside of this building finding and working with what we can, but now, there is no electricity, there is no water, and there is no food. We do not have anything. And we need to move on. There are some of you who are hesitant, and I understand that, it took me a long time to get around to the idea as well. But we need to leave, there is no other choice, we stay in here we starve, we go out there we have a shot at something, food, water, maybe other people. There is nothing for us here and I need everyone here to see that. We need to be on each others side about this. If I have to lose any of you, I want to lose you out there, fighting for something, not in here where it doesn’t mean anything.
That sounded gruesome, I’m not trying to be gruesome, I’m just trying to say what I feel. We need to do something. We can’t just stay here.
When this all started, I didn’t know any of you, and you didn’t know me. We thought none of this was important, felt that the life that we had out there was all that we could aspire to. We had dreams, a lot of us had dreams in the arts, writing, film, painting-well-none of that matters anymore, now, each of has only one dream of making it out of this one alive, and that’s a uniting dream, something that we all can be a part of. I want you to look into the face of the person sitting next to you and realize that they want nothing more than to see you alive, this day and the next, and that they will fight for it, and the same goes for the person across and all the way far off. In the beginning I was a bit of a grump, I’ll admit it, but with each week I’ve come to know each and every one of you and know you, and well, its meant a lot. We all want the same thing, right? Don’t we? I feel like I’m rambling again, like I always ramble. I’m sorry.
What I want to do is tell you a story, something that mattered to me, that may mean something to you. My father is…was…I don’t know. He worked as an insulator in construction yards for thirty years and was a provider. When I was born he gave up drinking and smoking and all the stupid shit he did to make my mother want to leave him, she still left him, but he wanted to be a part of mine and my sisters lives. He couldn’t because he worked so much and I remember one day, one special day with him. We drove out to a place that would become a municipal hospital, a place that would help people become well that he had been working on all week. He wanted to show me what he did, what caused the cuts all over his hands and the limp in his knee. He wanted to show me how he made the money to send me college. I walked with him inside the guts of a place that would be fantastic, the light from the unfilled windows making all the exposed metal shine. We stood and he walked with his hands raised showing me the lines and ducts he taped and secured, that he made safe. I remember being filled with something powerful in that moment, like I was being let in on a secret, that nobody else knew besides the two of us. And I never wanted to leave that hospital. I wanted to sit there and watch my father work and have it be built around me, to see those vents kick on for the first time…I don’t know where my father is now, I haven’t heard from him in fourteen weeks. I hope that he is safe. I hope that I never have to see him out there.
I want everybody to think of a moment like that and hold onto it, close your eyes, think real hard and find a moment like that, something that means something to you, whatever it is…I’m going to open this door and I need everyone standing and ready to go, we’re leaving, but we’re going to make it, we have each other, we have these new dreams.
I’m not much of a talker…I just hope everyone is ready to go.
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