…..and the years continued melting away akin to a glacier retreating under a blistering summer sun, and where he was once a recognized, undisputed expert in his chosen field of expertise such was no longer close to being the truth; he hadn’t been for some time. He had digressed into being a nobody, a cultural vagrant, an unwanted societal barnacle, a useless appendix jutting forth from humanity’s large intestine with no real job to do and no fundamental purpose in life. The times had passed him by long ago—it was hard to put a finger on when that day or month or year actually was—and his base of knowledge currently was no more relevant than the messianic study of coprolites or unearthing and henceforth indexing stuffy relics from volcano-ravaged Pompei. Instead of being a vital, contributing component of modern society, he was now just a boring, unnecessary vestige from the distant past who, if in a court of law was charged with taking up precious space and contaminating a finite oxygen supply by passing it through his parasitical lungs, would have had no choice but to plead guilty on both counts…..
Fred's Soapbox 