The Present

For a while now, I’ve been convinced that I am long dead. It started as mere musings, wondering if we — or my contemporaries — are so convinced by the reality of our surroundings that we are incapable of considering the possibility that our present — despite being so vivid and tangible and real to us — is now actually the somewhat distant past. 

It seemed prudent to keep these thoughts to myself at first, but one afternoon, as I was lounging on the beach on a beauteous summer’s day, I felt compelled by the ostensible reality and vividness of my surroundings — in addition to the ample amount of gin I had drunk — to divulge my thoughts. Gertrude (or Gerty) was sitting on the blanket next to me in her bathing- wear and cap, rubbing ointment into her calves and thighs and the now-reddening tops of her feet. 

“Have you ever wondered,” I said, “if this is not actually the present, but rather a bygone era?” 

Gerty didn’t bother to reply, focused on the task at hand. 

“What if everyone on this beach is already dead and gone? And our children, who are yet to be born, have already grown old, had children of their own, and died?” 

Gerty regarded me dubiously. “I think it’s time for you to give that gin a rest,” she said. 

I looked across the golden beach — a miniature Sahara with its twisting cones and smooth concavities. There was a photographer, likely representing one of the city’s newspapers, poised behind a heavy tripod, apparently assigned to document the bustling beach, which — if one squinted one’s eyes — was so crowded and alive with dark woolen bathing suits that it looked like a frantic scramble of ants. “See that man over there?” I said. “Perhaps the photo he is about to take — of all of us in the prime of our lives, enjoying the sun and the water and (I lifted my hand and imitated a bullrush swaying in the wind) these heavenly summer breezes — is now a faded photo in an archive somewhere with sad, tattered corners.” 

Gerty refrained from replying once again, now spreading ointment on her pale arms. 

“Perhaps when the people of the present consider the photo, they think that our bathing costumes are just as comical and ridiculous as we feel about swimwear from the Gilded Age.” 

“Where’s that gin?” Gerty said. “I’m going to need it if this is the sort of nonsense you’re going to be rambling about all day.” 

I handed her my flask and watched as she took a hearty sip. “It might seem completely absurd,” I continued, “but the company that produced that gin may have gone defunct a long time ago and has already been out of business for decades. The memory of its piney, fruity, and thoroughly enlivening flavor might well have died when we died.” 

“When we died?” Gerty said, lowering the flask from her perturbed lips. “Why are you using the past tense? How can our death be in the past if we are alive today!” 

“If today is in the past,” I said, “then my choice of tense would be perfectly accurate.” 

“Jesus Christ!” Gerty said with a dismal frown. “Why can’t you academic types ever just have a simple, straightforward thought like the rest of us? Everyone else on this beach — being sane — is perfectly willing to accept that we’re here, right now, at this very moment, in the summer of 1929.” 

“But what if it isn’t 1929?” I said. “What if it is now well into the future, past the 1980s or the 1990s — or even well into the third millennium?” 

“Then we’d all be living on the moon,” Gerty said. 

I hadn’t considered this possibility. “Yes!” I said. “That might well be the case for the people who are living in the present.” 

Gerty regarded me fiercely. “We are living in the present!” she said.

“But how can one be so sure of that?” 

 * * * 

I went down to the lake a few moments later, having been banished from our beach blanket by an exasperated Gerty. I sank my toes into the water to test the temperature, feeling an electric thrill throughout my body from the sharp chill. I looked at the other swimmers — the children bobbing about, the men and women wading up to their thighs or waist, and the young boys and girls soaring off the plank diving board on the floating dock. Marveling at it all, I could understand why one would have difficulty considering the possibility that this day — alive as it is — is long gone. It was nearly unfathomable even to me that all of this vigorous and thriving life could be nothing but a lost memory. The children, of course, were totally oblivious to any notion of time, briefly eternal as they splashed and laughed and submerged their heads. The men and women, regardless of age, laughed youthfully when they dipped under or stood with their hands hovering hesitantly above the surface. The boys and girls with their unblemished young skin, teenagers with their lean muscular bodies, heaving themselves off the dock one after the other. How could this ever be anything but now? 

I stepped into the chilled water, making the kind of sound that — ironically enough — was characteristic of one walking barefoot on a bed of hot coals. Once out past my knees, I turned back around and looked at the crowded beach and the bathing pavilion looming in the background, its open archways like huge eyes maintaining perpetual vigil over the bathers. The pavilion, with its Romanesque architecture and the pleasant tea garden on the second level, had only been in existence for about ten years, so it looked virtually new. Being situated so close to the water and exposed to the elements both inside and out, I wondered what it might look like if we were, in fact, inhabiting the past. If the present were far enough away, perhaps the pavilion resembled the heavily decayed remains of the Roman Colosseum — now regularly visited by enthusiastic tourists. 

My musings made me feel suddenly thirsty, so I waded back to the beach and navigated my way through the miasma of sunbathers and blankets. As I plodded forward, wrenching my feet from the warm soft sand, I considered the possibility that it might not even be summer at all in the present. It could, instead, be a bleak winter’s day — the beach completely devoid of activity or life, except perhaps for a handful of screeching gulls fighting over a scrap of garbage (that is, if gulls haven’t been eradicated in the present for being such an unpleasant nuisance). 

I leaned over our blanket to retrieve my towel. Gerty, who was now lying on her back, regarded me with her hand shielding her eyes. “How’s the water?” she said. 

“Heavenly.” I dried myself off, then rolled my flask inside the towel and tucked it under my arm. “I’m off to the tea garden,” I said. “Would you like to join me?” 

“Are you still postulating and hypothesizing?” Gerty said.

“Yes,” I said. 

“Then no,” Gerty said. She closed her eyes and folded her hands over her abdomen in a peaceful, funereal sort of way. 

“All right, then,” I said. “I will see you in a bit.” 

I made my way inside the airy pavilion, pausing to enjoy the ornate fountain in the courtyard, and then I climbed some sandy steps to the open-air tea garden. I took a seat at a table under a large sun-shade and ordered a glass of iced tea with lemon. When it arrived, I added a splash of gin to my refreshment, and then I looked out over the beach and on to the sun-speckled lake. The cheerful and enlivening view made the novelty of my hypothesis diminish to some degree. I suddenly began to feel profoundly mournful that this day — with its incredible beauty and innocent gaiety — could now be totally lost in time.  

* * * 

My sense of being in the past did not diminish over the following weeks but rather grew to an almost intuitive certainty. It wasn’t rational, of course, but rather a gut feeling, like knowing a particular student will excel more than the others without hearing him or her utter a single word. I started to slack off at my job, handing out assignments rather than lecturing, as it seemed slightly pointless to exert myself if my career was already long over and all of my achievements (though few) have been long forgotten. Despite my diminishing work ethic, I found myself sexually driven to an unusual degree. The notion that Gerty had already aged, perhaps borne some children, become old and fragile and then perished (hopefully in the presence of her loving offspring), seemed to heighten and emphasize her current youth and beauty. I was possessed by a sense of urgency, thinking that if all of this is done and gone, then I mustn’t delay or procrastinate and wait until tomorrow to make love to her.  

Gerty, thankfully, was not opposed to my fervent advances, but she did seem a little surprised by the sudden renewal of my vigor, which had waned to some degree after Gerty’s mother had visited two months prior and insisted that we marry immediately and conceive at least seven or eight children. 

In some ways, my life had improved markedly. I had a healthful and fulfilling sex life, and because I was taking my job in stride, I didn’t derive much in the way of stress from it. I did, however, start to develop a rather gloomy and macabre mentality. When out for a walk or a drive, I would look at the cars on the road or lining the sidewalk, intuitively aware that they had all visited the wrecker’s a long time ago, and then thereafter had rusted to dust over the decades. I looked at the advertisements in the shop windows for “state of the art” radios and appliances, convinced that there was no longer anything remotely state of the art about them. Their size, being relatively small, had likely increased significantly over the years as engineers added far more sophisticated technology, so that the people of the present would regard our puny radios as nothing more than farcical little toys. 

When I walked by the graveyard that was close to our house, I noted the broad spaces between the headstones, suspecting that it was far more crowded in the present. Then I would look around at the people on the sidewalk, convinced that at least a few us — being steadfast locals — were buried in that cemetery under a stone that is already decades old — cracked and neglected and just all-around depressing. 

* * * 

In mid-October, Gerty came through the front door looking distraught. She was dressed in a beautiful and playful hat with a large feather, which, I thought, complemented her appearance and character perfectly. I was seated on my chair in the living room, sipping a cup of tea and contemplating the present, visualizing with a kind of inner fascination what it might look like. 

“I ran into Frank,” Gerty said in a somewhat accusatory tone. 

“Oh, did you?” I said, placing my tea cup on its saucer. “How is he?”

“He said you haven’t been to work for a week!” she exclaimed.

“Mmm,” I said. “I have decided to take a brief sabbatical.” 

“A sabbatical?” Gerty said with a sharp rise in intonation. “Why?” 

I knew she wouldn’t be pleased with my reasons, but there seemed to be no other alternative but to tell her the truth. “I have been too fixated on the present to focus on lecturing,” I said. 

Gerty, of course, was thoroughly nonplussed. “Too fixated on the present?” 

“Yes,” I said. “It has come to consume me. If everything around us has perished or decayed to dust, then what has replaced it?” 

Gerty’s face looked stiffened with worry. “Is this what you were babbling about on the beach?” she said. “Are you still thinking about that?” 

“Yes,” I said. “It’s all that I can think about.” 

“And you’ve taken time off of work because of it?” Gerty said, once again with an exaggerated rise in intonation. “What about your students?” 

“Though it’s very sad and hard to fathom, they are already long dead and gone.” 

Gerty regarded me with a stupefied look, her cupid’s-bow lips gaping. “I think you might need to talk to someone about this.” 

“I have considered that, too,” I said. “Perhaps I could talk to Edward in the philosophy department. He and I have lunch in the faculty cafeteria from time to time. I believe that he’s a rationalist, so maybe he — despite the absence of empirical evidence — could find a sound argument for why it is perfectly reasonable to believe that we are not inhabiting the present.” 

“No!” Gerty said. “I was referring to a head doctor. What you’re saying is complete madness.” 

“You think I’m losing my mind?” I said with an ironic smile. 

“Well, if you’re taking time off of work because you think that we’re living in the past, then yes, I’d say you’ve gone a bit screwy.” 

“I really don’t see the point,” I said. “If this is all over, then I can’t imagine that talking to a psychiatrist could change much.” 

“My God!” Gerty said. “I’m calling Mildred. Her husband Bernard is a psychologist. You’re off your chump.” 

 * * * 

I was forced to acquiesce to Gerty’s demands that I see a psychologist. She said that she was deeply concerned about my mental well-being, but beyond that she stated that if I didn’t go, she would take a butter knife to my throat. 

Bernard’s offices were in a part of town that was — as they say — up-and-coming. I suspected that the neighborhood had long transitioned to an area with higher real estate value, better schools, and a lower mafia-related crime and murder rate, but here in the past it was rather unsettling. 

When I located the building, I took the elevator to the third floor and, checking in with the receptionist, I took a seat and picked up the newspaper on the table beside me. The article on the front page was about the faltering economy, which would usually cause me concern, but knowing that I had already bought the farm, it didn’t seem worthwhile to worry too much about the threat that a precarious economy could pose to my livelihood. 

In a moment, the receptionist said that Bernard was ready for me, so I went into the office and took a seat on the other side of an impressive rosewood desk. Bernard had — when he was actually alive — been a strikingly handsome man. His eyes and mouth, so perfectly situated, were like the carefully chosen punctuation in a beautiful poem. 

“So,” he said with a pleasant smile. “Gerty tells me that you’re under the impression that we’re living in the past.” 

“Yes,” I said. “I am quite convinced of it.” 

“Can you tell me why you feel this way?” Bernard asked. 

I contemplated this briefly, then said, “I think it’s a form of presumption to assume that our time is the present. Everyone, at every point in history, believed so steadfastly that their time was the true present, yet they are all long dead and gone.” 

Bernard nodded silently, considering my argument. 

“I also believe that it’s a form of complacency,” I added.

“Complacency?” Bernard said. 

I nodded vigorously. “I think that we have become too comfortable with the notion that our time is the present. It is lazy to assume that we are still alive and take what is before us at face value — without question or even a modicum of examination.” 

Bernard smiled once again, apparently amused by this. “Listen,” he said. “I know you’re an academic, so you’re likely prone to unconventional thought. I’ve humored some pretty abstract ideas myself at times. Gerty tells me that you’re thinking of getting married and starting a family. This could all just be paternal anxiety. When my wife told me she was pregnant, I contemplated running away and joining the circus. I always wanted to be a high-wire performer as a kid. But you know, the idea passed pretty quickly.” 

This actually made me pause. I hadn’t really considered that my fixation on the present could simply be a side effect of deep-seated paternal anxiety. 

“I recommend that you return to work and keep this to yourself from here on in,” Bernard said. “It’s perfectly fine to use abstraction to distract yourself from anxiety, but make sure you stop short before you’re actually 70 feet up, teetering on the high wire.” 

 * * * 

I decided to heed Bernard’s advice and return to work. I realized that it was misguided to think that my career mattered very little if I were already retired and dead. As with my sense of urgency to make love to Gerty, I felt suddenly that if my teaching days were long over, it was crucial to enjoy it and try to excel at it as much as possible. This was not an attempt to create a legacy for the people of the present to admire, but rather to bestow a love of literature that my students, who have sadly bitten the dust, might have bestowed to their children, who in turn handed down to their children, who might actually be alive in the present. 

I also agreed with Bernard that it was best not to burden Gerty with my somewhat unorthodox way of thinking. If it was true that a deeply ingrained, unconscious terror of fatherhood was at the root of my belief that we were living in the past, then I felt it best to keep the fact that our children are already long dead to myself, as it might lead Gerty to think that I’m having second thoughts. 

At the end of October, a catastrophic historical event took place. The stock market crashed, completely wiping out the savings and fortunes of an extraordinary number of people in a single day. There was an acute sense of panic, the newspapers stating that this was tantamount to an economic apocalypse. 

The day after the crash, Gerty looked deeply unsettled as she was reading through the paper. “What does this mean for the future?” she said. “They say that people are throwing themselves off of buildings because they lost everything.” She regarded me interrogatively. “What about you? You had most of your savings invested. You’re not thinking of killing yourself, are you?” 

If my perspective had been different, I might actually have contemplated committing suicide, but I was well aware that the economy had in all likelihood long recovered from this crisis. 

“Quite the contrary,” I said. “I was thinking about going to the beach today.” 

“The beach!” Gerty said. “The economy has just collapsed, and you’re going to the beach?”

“Why not?” I said. “It’s a gorgeous day.” 

Gerty clenched her brow, suspicious. “It’s October,” she said. 

“What could be wrong with visiting the beach on a beautiful day in October?” I countered. 

Gerty studied me skeptically. “You’re not going to do anything stupid, are you? Are you planning to put some bricks in your pants and drown yourself in the lake?” 

I laughed at this. “No,” I said. “I will just sit on a bench and savor the day.” 

Gerty didn’t seem entirely convinced, but she ultimately shrugged and said, “All right, but if you’re going out, get some canned vegetables and canned ham on the way home for dinner.” 

 * * * 

I traveled to the beach on the city streetcar. The faces of the people around me were grim and fearful, having had their foundation crumble beneath their feet. I wondered if they would be so dour and afraid if they were aware — as I was — that the frightening events of this moment in history are now likely nothing more than the subject of poorly-written-and-researched high school history essays. 

When I got off the streetcar, I walked down to the beach and admired the impressive bathing pavilion. The tea garden was now closed, and there was no activity on the beach other than some screeching gulls fighting over the carcass of a smelt fish. The leaves shed from the trees lining the beach swept past me, flipping like a scattered deck of varicolored cards along the hardened sand. I took a seat on a bench and looked out at the choppy lake. Normally, my mind would be elsewhere, wholly unconscious of my breath, my heartbeat, the chilled air so sharp in my nostrils that it was like minute shards of airborne ice. But knowing that this moment was long past made me acutely aware of every aspect of the day. 

I considered the beauty of my surroundings, well aware that any rational person would think that I’m completely mad for believing that all of this — despite being so vividly real and sensorially palpable — is long long ago, but I know that I am not alone, as you know it too.