Henny Penny, Alive and Well?

Prompt: Write a Story about People Preparing for Y2K.

Henny Penny, Alive and Well?

My head was tilted up to the sky as I eagerly anticipated the ball drop in Times Square. The weather was typically mild for this December. I felt a mist upon my face as I continued gazing up to the heavens. Perhaps like so many others in the crowd, this was my first time to watch the spectacle of a large man-made six-foot ball of glass crystals plummet over 70 feet on a pole nearly 400 feet above my head. The frenzied crowd counted down the time each passing minute.

On any other December 31 this ball drop would simply signify the passing of one year into the next. But this was 1999. The world was to embark into a new era, the twenty-first century; a new millennium offering to the world new prospects of hope, peace, and disaster?

I think that many people in this outrageously boisterous crowd were expecting something to happen. After all, the next millennium would not make a grand appearance for another thousand years. Television and radio news seemingly started coverage of this passage of time after the ball drop into 1999. It was insane because all one could hear in the days up to New Year’s Eve was how people were becoming frantic about this event. As the months passed in 1999, there were exclamations of “the sky is falling,” in reference to airplanes falling from the sky as planes would incur computer glitches during midair flights. Henny Penny, aka Chicken Little, was no longer a fictitious bird, but a horde of crazed, frightened Americans including myself.

Countless hours were invested by commercial companies and computer programmers into altering computer software updating time stamping from the 19 hundreds to the 2000’s. Most of the public were under the notion that computers would cease to operate if the calendar year could not change out of the 1900’s into the new millennium.  This fear of the technological unknown caused worldwide concern plus significant financial investment to implement changes avoiding the so-called Y2K glitch, the Y2K bug, or more demonstratively, the ominous millennium bug. All of this hype was taking its toll on the American public. I was not immune to it either. 

Reports of the national and local news highlighted stories of hordes of people heading to warehouse stores, hardware stores, and sporting goods stores to purchase various types of provisions. Anything and everything for personal survival was targeted.  At times people would literally fight over items in the stores. Nerves were frayed at large corporations. Panic was at its maximum for the small business owner whose payroll depended on less sophisticated computer software. The banking industry was alarmed that their vaults would not open come January 1^st. Airport control towers were nervous about airborne flights on New Year’s Eve. Would the airplanes just stop working? Would the missiles at U.S. silo installations misfire? Certainly no one in the aviation industry and military were saying anything, at least publicly.

Oh boy! Here I am just another pawn immersed in a technological quagmire of epic proportions! I had to follow suit with the herds of crazed wanna-be survivalists. Time was running out in 1999. I had procrastinated way too long. Deftly making my way through the crowded aisles of the stores, I procured an assortment of leftover goods.  I bought bottled water, canteens, sleeping bags, thermal wear, RTE (ready to eat) meals, a gas-operated generator, a mini-Quonset hut assembly, and even a gas mask. I loaded this gear and headed to upper state New York. With some monetary incentive, I secured a small plot of under developed, secluded property from a realtor in a tiny town off the beaten path. I set up the hut with all my provisions. I camouflaged my new quarters with the overgrowth from the property. I was set for anything that would come my way when the calendar turns over to year 2000. My preparedness left me over confident and bored. I felt the need to head back to civilization. I headed back to New York to witness firsthand the unfolding of Y2k in the center of Times Square. I was very uneasy, but I had to witness what was going to happen. I had my escape route carefully planned out back to my hut in the event a catastrophe ensued. I might have well underestimated, however, the enormity of people congestion was overwhelming. The crowds were stifling my movement.

Here I stood among millions in Times Square looking up at the sky. For a moment I thought I was the real idiot because my extensive preparations were back at my bunker home in the rugged hills of upper New York state. My anxiety was peaking as the ball began to descend. I lost my self-assurance halfway through the ball drop. I began to slowly breathe to ease my stress. Then the ball stopped. I looked at my watch. It was midnight. My clock ticked to 12:01; then 12:02 and on and on. The crowds were jubilant, dancing, singing, and yelling.  It seemed like no one had a care in the world at this moment in time.

The new millennium had begun. I was still here. Nothing fell from the sky. There were no reports of airplanes crashing into buildings.  No missiles misfired. No wars were instantaneously instigated.

An unknown woman next to me kissed me on my lips. I was hugged repeatedly. I sensed a collectively sigh of relief. I think it was mainly my own. As the crowds thinned out, I walked down Park Avenue toward 50^th Street. I saw a marque near St. Bart’s church with this message:

“Can anyone of you worrying add one single hour to your life? (Matthew 6:27, NIV)

“Therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” (Matthew 6:34, NIV)

“Grace, mercy and peace from God the Father and from Jesus Christ, the Father’s Son, will be with us in truth and love.” (2 John: 1:3, NIV)

I knew I would be okay. I just had to put my trust in something much greater than mans’ technology! My gaze to the heavens will go beyond a crystal ball drop to see the stars fall from the sky and the glory of the Lord returning on the clouds as He promised.

“The stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken. At that time people will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory.” (Matthew 13: 25-26, NIV)

NIV-New International Version

Author: Pete Gautchier

Acknowledgment: Reedsy.com (prompts)