Year 2040
Architecture.
Isn’t it beautiful?
We used to live in solid brick houses.
Solid.
Thick.
Opaque.
Bricks.
Keeping the fire burning in wood fed fireplaces and warm bodies with red noses from the winter chill.
But now, we live in an age of glass.
Glass trees.
Glass animals.
Glass people.
Glass houses.
Everything is so transparent, nowadays. We decorate our houses with the best of our furniture. Dazzling mint couches and that lamp that just lights up the room. And all the things we don’t want to put on display goes in the basement where no one can see it. Like that ugly sweater your grandma knit for you when you were six or those hand me down baseball cards your dad left for you.
Picture frames have a small table to themselves, the family poised with plastic smiles. While candids with friends have their own wall, faced outwards for the rest of the world to see.
People even pass by and tell you how much they love the pictures or comment on how nice you decorated the place.
Everything is so transparent.
Clear.
Open.
Your likes, dislikes, which friends you don’t talk to anymore.
Everyone sees us now, through and through, and we’re more vulnerable than ever.
Fragile. Shatterable. Easy to damage.
It’s what glass is.
We now live in an era where we have to be so careful not to break anything or anyone.
One wrong move and the environment is in shambles.
One wrong word and you get shot.
One wrong choice and we’re forced to live a life we never wanted to lead.
Society isn’t opaque anymore.
We’ve created this society for ourselves and we can’t go back.
So until we gain perspective on how to live better,
We have to exist in our glass houses the way we do
And keep our lights dim until the night goes black and we don’t have to act anymore.