Where are the aliens? (they're coming, right?)

The other day a bunch of us were talking. We collectively confessed to be anxious about things in general. It was me who piped up: "What about the aliens?"

The unreality that set in with the pandemic's worldwide catastrophe-all-around-people-dying-by-the millions-isolated-and-no-way-to-stop-it "thing," has yes, softened. We're not as intensely scared as we used to be. But that doesn't mean we're out of the woods. And if habits take only three repetitions to be formed, then how is it even possible, after years of fear and isolation, that we now can "go back to normal." We do our best to cope and basically, we're pretending. But nobody talks about the pretense. Nobody talks about how the other shoe will fall --we just don't know how or when. Doesn't it feel just a little bit like we're farm animals and we've been herded into our corral? We've been herded into a sort of obedience. Am I the only one who feels this way? 

I personally don't think aliens is out of the question. I hear you laughing, but the feeling of unease that settles if you don't pretty much continually distract yourself is unnerving. There is an artificiality to life. Certainly, you admit that, right? News is filtered. How do we know there are not lots and lots of stories about aliens and they're just being squashed. I try to stay in touch with world news but it's challenging. How do we know what's going on in lots of places? Here it is 2023 and we should have a robust interface where news is a matrix with lots of news stations all working cooperatively so we can stay in touch. I want to hear the local stories about the world and not in an, 'oh you'll love this' kind of way. I'm tired of the segments of the world being parsed out like we have nothing in common with everyone else. We do. We're human and we share the world. Let's figure it out. Let's be kind. Let's be tolerant. Let's be smart and figure out how to manage the changes that are already taking place not to mention the scenarios too difficult to manage in any kind of individualized way. Countries need to cooperate. People need to work together. I hear you laughing again and you're right. You'd think by the 21st century people would be able to get along and not spend most of their time one-upping each other. We've got other fish to fry. Take for example, weather-related emergencies, which manifest on a 45-60 day basis. These events (that's what we call them now) are influenced by global warming and the behaviors that led to it. We're chipping away on that front but not as a cohesive cooperative world. By the time we're there, the fires will be self-igniting on the ground (hyperbole--but not a lot).

Is this perspective influenced by having watched Twilight Zone as a young teen? I remember that Rod Serling show and how theoretically unlikely things took place. You gen Z and whatevers ought to check it out. There was this one episode where a bunch of cul-de-sac-ers (sorry, I made up that word) got their self-satisfied backyard lives turned upside down and it was all because of a series of orchestrated events. The conductor (of the events) was--you guessed it--an alien. Is it so very unlikely? I wonder. I'm in denial, the same as you. I spend evenings worrying and petting my cat.