The Gathering Place

It became a gathering place, more by accident than anything else, although, it had the river and the sea which were both useful. It was small enough for us all at first. When we arrived there were just the six of us, but after time more arrived, slowly in the beginning; one or two every six weeks or so, but soon I found myself Lord of a small village.

I did not want to be in charge. I’d had enough of that before The End came. I’d been running my own business and getting sick of all the petty administration and government rules and regulations. I had seriously considered selling-up and getting out. Then The End came and there was no more business, no more government and – mostly – no more people.

Now I am the government. I still hate government, but now I see it is necessary… even though I do as little of it as I can get away with. I’d much rather be working the fields, fishing in the river or out at sea in one of our boats. I prefer even herding the sheep to looking after the village, even though the similarities always tend to make me smile.

It is the endless bickering about who does and who doesn’t do ‘their fair share’ that get me down, that and the arguments over women. You would think, well, I used to think – before The End – that somehow if humanity could start again, reboot our civilisation, and that the next time we’d do it better, especially after all we’ve learnt.

Instead, I should have looked at all those ‘revolutionary’ societies, the communists and fascists and so on and how they had all fallen apart trying to create something new.

It seem that humanity will always create some kind of balls-up when more than a few of us get together to build something. So, these days, I just try to sit back and let it – sort of – evolve, sort itself out.

Sometimes, I even think it will… eventually.