That night I couldn’t sleep for some reason, so I decided to sit on the roof. Don’t ask why, it just felt right. The roof was wet and cold and dirty, and I’m sure I ruined a perfectly fine t-shirt, but I didn’t really care. I just sat there. Every so often I changed positions just to keep myself comfortable. It was a roof, after all.

Only the moon was shining. The stars were blotted out by suburban ambient light. The only true connection to the past, what our ancestors lived and died with and for, simply effaced from the sky because we wanted to stay up late. I’ve only seen a fully starlit sky once. And I never really planned to see one again.

The crickets and cicadas were making themselves known, as usual in the summer. They never seemed to shut up. But after awhile on that roof, I didn’t mind their presence. It was the kind of thoughtless din that, if you don’t think, just fades away after awhile. It was a silent clamor that simply wasn’t worth my attention.

I stared at the endless array of houses down the street. All those houses were inhabited by some family, old or new, large or small. All of the neighbors had their concerns, their problems, their issues, their successes, their failures. And I didn’t care about any of those things. And the neighbors didn’t care about mine. Suffering is universal, but so is apathy.

I slept on the roof that night, and it was the worst decision of my life.