THE SKY

Roland Gwardion had been out watering his sidewalk one morning when by accident he had happened to look up and noticed that the sky was falling. At least it had seemed to him that it was closer to the ground than he was used to seeing it. He didn't really think much about it at the time and went back to watering his sidewalk. He had bought some property last year and built his present house on it, and was a little disturbed because while everything else on the property seemed to be doing well, the sidewalk just wouldn't grow. He had watered it daily and sometimes twice a day, and he had poured fertilizer on it as well. But when he watered it the fertilizer just ran off on either side. The sidewalk was three feet wide and he wanted it to grow to six feet. He wasn't sure what his next step would be. Maybe he would have to consult one of those agricultural extension agents or something to ask how to make a concrete sidewalk grow.

Anyway, to get back to the matter at hand, after Mr. Gwardion had first noticed the sky falling he made it a point to observe the situation at the same time every day. Sure enough, each day it was getting a little closer to the ground. The process was a apparently a very slow one and would not pose a threat for several weeks or even a few months, but obviously unless something was done to alter the situation the sky was eventually going to fall to Earth. Mr. Gwardion did not wish to panic his neighbors, but he did determine that he would not be caught unprepared. He first erected a series of twenty-foot high metal rods around the perimeter of his property, then tied a tarpaulin over the tops of these rods. He felt the tarpaulin would catch the sky when it fell and he would be protected below.

But after a few days he decided he didn't like the permanent semi-darkness produced by this covering, so he took the tarpaulin down and instead spread a giant fishnet over the tops of the metal rods. Now he figured the sky would still be caught and stopped before it fell on his property, and he could still enjoy daylight. He had assumed that sooner or later his neighbors would notice for themselves that the sky was falling and take appropriate action, and he became somewhat concerned that no one seemed to be doing anything to protect themselves from this imminent disaster.

After giving the matter considerable thought, he decided to say nothing. After a few weeks, the sky did fall, and Mr. Gwardion's fishnet did keep it from falling to the ground on his property. But he was somewhat puzzled when he saw that his neighbors kept going about their business as if nothing had happened. They didn't even realize the sky had fallen.

After a few weeks he figured there was no point in keeping his fishnet up if everyone else was going to continue to pretend nothing had happened. So he finally took down the net. When he did, the sky fell, crushing his house and his too-narrow sidewalk. He was 36.