I am not one to ponder on things. Well, okay, I am. However, recently I have been watching these apocalyptic shows on the History Channel and ABC and pairing it up with 'The World Without Us' by Alan Weisman. Needless to say it has made me dwell on my own mortality and what I will contribute to this world.
This all started in early 2008 when the History Channel aired 'Life After People'. For those of you that know me pretty well, it is a safe bet that I will bring up post-apocalyptic goodness in a conversation at least once. The shows premise was to show what our world would look like should humanity up and leave. It wasn't pretty. In all reality, not much would survive seeing as we've abandoned more permanent building methods for ways of building that require constant maintenance. The show had CGI special effects that showed what a world devoid of man would look like. It was really cool and got me on a post-apocalyptic kick.
Then came 'The World Without Us'. This book, by Alan Weisman, is what 'Life After People' is partly based on. My father-in-law told me about it, stating "it's right up your alley." He was right. I started reading it and at first, it paralleled the History Channel special almost to a tee. Then we got into nuclear waste and weaponry, and non biodegradable items. The book slowly shifted focus from a world without us to a world that we are screwing up. Granted, in order to really predict what the world would be like without us one would need to look at the current environmental nightmare to gain an accurate perspective. I actually had to stop reading the book for a while because I found that I was getting depressed. That was back in February.
In late April/early May, I discovered that Life After People had become a weekly show on the History Channel. I set my DVR to record them and I picked up 'The World Without Us' again. Big mistake. What made it all worse, though, was the ABC special 'Earth: 2100'. The shows idea was to follow the life of a fictitious person named 'Lucy' from her birth in the good 'ol days of 2009 through her death in the 2090s. Of course, the world deteriorated into chaos as the environment and our natural resources became more and more depleted. Throughout Lucy's 'life' they interjected with current events and such, which just made the special all the more depressing. What's worse is that the world they presented could be a possible scenario. The point of the show was to explain that the end of the world doesn't just happen in an instant, it takes time and gathers strength. In the end, the US was thrown into the equivalent of the Dark Ages and the country splintered into almost feudal states. Ugh.
I was depressed for 3 days after Earth: 2100. It was a special brand of awful. The problem is, while I like apocalyptic alter-realities, the notion that our current actions could lead us to that sort of world both terrifies and depresses me.
Needless to say, I have pressed 'pause' on my apocalyptic show-watching for the moment...
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