Bitter Remembrance

I would like to apologize for any mistakes in my writing - it’s dark in here and I have to write this on my phone. I suppose I should give you an idea of where I am, though you may have heard the news already. At 12:23pm today there was a magnitude 6.1 earthquake not far from where I work… Consequently, at the same moment I was in an elevator headed down to the second floor break room to grab my lunch - a pathetic and yet oddly tantalizing tuna salad sandwich. A wiser man than I may have taken the stairs, perhaps only to burn a few extra calories on the way down in order to circumvent the sedentary lifestyle my job requires, but I chose to take the elevator, as I always do. Not even fifteen seconds into my journey down, the lights went out and the elevator grinded to a halt. I prayed that the power would come back in a few minutes, but I had felt the quaking of the ground even in my little metal box, so that hope quickly dwindled and receded into the fens of my subconscious. 

It has been 45 minutes now, according to my phone, and I don’t know if I’ll make it out of here. To clarify, I don’t lack oxygen - I popped open the top of the elevator for some air, but I do feel the pressing shadows of death around me… I know it sounds odd to you, perhaps a little too poetic, but what cause have I to lie?

Oh, and I’ve lived a terrible life too, so I feel the wings of death with a malevolent eagerness. I might sum up my existence by noting that they won’t write about me in the papers, should I die in here. No, I will be but a passing mention at the bottom of the long list of people who probably died from this earthquake. “Marcus Preobrazhensky - 54”, they’ll write in tiny letters… I wouldn’t be surprised if they spelled my name wrong!

But I shouldn’t get ahead of myself, as much as I want to fester in bitterness for the last few hours to write… perhaps you want the full story, whoever you are. To say that I am a wicked man, as you may have assumed, would be inaccurate. I’ve never hurt somebody without reason, and I’ve never tried to be a wrench in the works of society. I simply assert in my proclamation of a “terrible life”, that I have lived an unremarkable life, in every sense of the word. 

When I was a child, I was quite studious and yet always fell short of achieving good marks. I remember a particular incident where I had studied all week for a big math exam, depriving myself of sleep and food in my zeal, only to fail the exam so extraordinarily that I had to retake the class… my schoolmates never let me live that one down; if they even condescended to speak to me, it would be to denigrate my intellect, or lack thereof, and assert that I was the spectacular luddite who was dull even though I spent hours sharpening myself… and of course I couldn’t rebut: the class rankings showed me near the bottom every year. 

As I got older, I kept working hard and falling short of academic success, even in the meanest terms. So I entrenched myself in resentment for those who seemed to succeed naturally. Maybe I could’ve asked one of those students for help… but my strangely obstinate pride kept me from ever mingling with them. Somehow or another, I got into an engineering school when I had finished highschool. It wasn’t a particularly good one, as my schoolmates remarked ceaselessly, but I was still pleased. My parents, who loved me as one might a dullard - that is to say, too much, were thrilled, and sent me off with a passionate embrace. 

However, even in college I managed to find myself near the bottom of every ranking - the effect now worsened because all of the truants and delinquents who had previously padded the bottom of the rankings in highschool were no longer there with me in college. I did manage to curry favor with one professor, who perhaps took pity on me. He all but gave me a job at his former company, the same place I work now, in a menial role. Each day, I was to fill out basic spreadsheets with data gathered by the scientists. Then I would send out my spreadsheets, which often contained thousands of entries, to “more experienced” engineers who would analyze it for utility and validity. Where it went after that, I know not. I was promised that the role would be mine for a few years, until I learned enough to become one of those “more experienced” engineers… but it has been twenty years and I’m still filling out the same spreadsheets. The professor, now a retired old man, remains the only reason I haven’t been fired. 

You might think that with twenty years at the same company I would have a strong social circle which extends deeply into upper management, as most of the people at those high ranks are around my age, but nothing could be further from the truth. My lack of friends in my school days ill-prepared me for the corporate environment. I realized very quickly that I didn’t know how to talk to people in a friendly manner - or really how to talk to people at all, unless I needed something. Those precious few years in which I might have made a few company friends in my mid-twenties were gone, and now most of the people I work around are half my age and snicker at me: the stubbornly stupid man.

Now you’re probably wondering, in your benign hopefulness, that I picked up a hobby or two… or perhaps that my social circle was strong outside of work, but I’m afraid you’d be wrong on both counts. The same wounds I incurred as a result of my obsessive studying which prevented me from making any friends at work also pushed out any hobbies I might have had. I vaguely remember painting… maybe only for a summer. I tried picking that up again in my forties, and the result was so abhorrent that I shudder to think of it even now. I frequent bars after work, but I drink at the dark corner tables, with some wild hope that I look mysterious enough for a young woman, or man, for that matter, to approach me, but of course that has never happened. Every night I drink myself into a stupor and stumble into my battered apartment, barely managing to kick my shoes off before I fall into bed, asleep before I hit the pillows.

A life entirely without redemption, and so isolated that even the abyss shrinks before me - that’s the life I have lived. And now it ends as pathetically as it always was… alone in a dark, cold elevator. I would assume that you’re feverishly trying to find ways out of the elevator for me. Maybe I could climb out of the top and work my way up the cables to the next floor, where I could pry open the doors and escape? Don’t you think I’ve already tried that? Even if I wasn’t fat and out of shape, the little square at the top of the elevator is too small for a normal human to fit through, and I haven’t climbed anything akin to a rope since elementary school gym class. Could I call for help? Well, I have been pressing the emergency button every five minutes for… at least an hour and a half now, and nothing has happened. My phone has no service here, and the wifi went out with the power. 

Of course there’s also the presupposition in planning my escape that I even want to leave. Why would I? What would I be escaping to? Out of one prison and into another, I think. No, if it weren’t for the gnawing hunger I feel (of course it had to happen during my lunch break), then I would be fully content to sit in this elevator until help arrives, or I pass out from exhaustion. I don’t know if any buildings have collapsed around mine, but I pray that they have - that way it’ll take longer for first responders to get to me! I’m even thinking about closing the little lid at the top of this elevator… 

Sorry, that got dark. I assure you, I don’t wish harm on anyone else. You must understand that because… well, because there will be no one to vouch for me after I’m gone except for you. There won’t be a funeral - who would attend? And there sure won’t be some somber remembrance at work for me, especially if anyone other than myself has also died. They’ll make a big to-do about them, I’m sure, but not for Marcus Preobrazhensky. 

I just closed the top of the elevator, and I don’t plan on reopening it. If help arrives in the next few hours, then so be it, but if it doesn’t… I don’t want to step out of this elevator again. Let it be my coffin - bury me in it, alongside the detritus of society of which I am an unashamed part. But they won’t do that… they’ll put me in a thin wooden casket and burn me to ash before they honor me in any way. 

***

It has been several hours since I last picked up my phone - I decided to take a nap. Maybe it’s just in my head, but I think I can feel the air getting thinner… That time may be near, so you may be wondering about my reflections in this rather unique situation. Perhaps you think that I look back on my life and see all of those little moments of vibrance and passion in a new light, or that I recall every blade of grass and every tiny leaf with wistful longing. In any case, you’d be wrong. I may be an idiot, but I am not Myshkin… I see life as I have always seen it - completely wasted on me. I don’t recollect the fluffy beauty of the clouds on azure skies in my youth, nor do I wish I was back there. Why would I honor the world by giving it a validation of beauty? I also do not have any revolutionary philosophical ideas. I have received no epiphanies on the human condition - no ideas into mortality, existence, or anything like that. The only stray thought which has been flitting in and out of my consciousness regards my tuna salad sandwich… I wonder if it has gone bad. 

You may view these notes as the last scribblings of a nihilistic madman, but that would be the furthest thing from the truth. I am not so bitter as to deny life any possible meaning; I only know that what I have been through is a useless, meaningless, and pitiful excuse for a life. I’m also not crazy, and on that I would die. A man as inadequate as myself, as stupid, let’s not mince words, has only his reason to fall back on, and I will maintain until the end that I am reasonable. And speaking of end… I must close these notes now. My battery is dying, and I can definitely tell the air has gotten thinner. I can only sign my name and say adieu - Marcus Preobrazhensky.