Alligators in the Operating System (52 Weeks, Episode 12)
Who pulls the strings? Who builds the guns?
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Last night, I fell asleep to conspiracy theories. In the bed beside me, Amber listened to Instagrammers speculate about Jeffrey Epstein and his connection to anyone with power. Tech billionaires. Intelligence agencies. Movie directors. Dead financiers.
The conspiracy theories are running wild because a new tranche of Epstein files was released this week—over 3 million to be exact—and the Department of Justice has made it searchable. This is bad news for a few men named Bill.
The talking heads gave way to dreams. In those dreams, I share a compound on the edge of a swamp with a group of everyday Americans. These are not friends, but companions of convenience, and each carries a rifle dotted with rust spots on any metallic component. In the water, hundreds of alligators swim toward the compound, and the leader of our small army gives an order. We square crosshairs between the eyes of the alligators and spray hundreds of bullets across the water. From the scope, I watch a bullet as if in slow motion. It hits the alligator between the eyes, and still the alligator keeps coming. I fire again and again and again, each hitting the target, but still the oversized lizards come. Everything smells of gunpowder and anxiety. Everything is inevitable.
The alligators make their way to the compound, but before they enter, I make my way out the back door where two wild jackals—a mom and its young—are hunting a white rabbit. They have it by the hindquarters, and the rabbit tries to wriggle free. I raise my rifle and fire again, and once again, the bullet finds its mark. The pup looks at me, cranes its head back, and laughs. I see all its teeth. They are not the teeth of a jackal, but instead, two rows of snow-white human veneers. Saliva strings stretch from the lower back molars to the uppers. I wish the white rabbit luck, and just like that, the invisible hand pulls me from the swamp shore into the real world.
Beside me, Tippa paws me awake. It is 3:04 a.m. She needs to wander into our snow-covered front yard and tend to her business.
On Saturday afternoon, I text Mike Rusch: … the Epstein Files started getting released which means there will be a war by Tuesday. Then, Feel free to screen shot this prediction.
He responds: Haha. I’m not sure it’s a prediction… it’s more of “this is just what happens.”
Of course, in a normal world there’d be no strong likelihood of war in this particular moment. I remind myself that we no longer live in a normal world. If the file release is any indication, maybe we never did live in a normal world. That epiphany eats at me. It doesn’t feel quite right, so I recalibrate. Maybe this is the way of history, the course the river of power has always run.
Lord, have mercy.
3.
In the morning, I review the scans I receive from The Dark Room, a film developer based out of California. I’ve been testing an old Pentax Spotmatic camera—a camera manufactured between 1964 and 1976—and the photos show a small slice of everyday life in the Ozarks.
It can be difficult to describe an Ozark life. It’s a red Ford truck that missed the hairpin turn on Firetower Road. It’s a classic car outside the Waffle House. It’s beautiful horses outside of well-weathered barns. It’s people who chase nostalgia like a coyote chases a scent, sometimes to their peril. That’s the reason for all those shows that cater to buses full of boomers up there in Branson, Missouri. It’s also the reason for all the diners with their glorious stacks of pancakes.
There are good people here who lean into the Ozark anachronisms. What does it mean to hold to the veneer of American ideals in a country where the American ideal is up for grabs?
I look at the photo of the old red Ford slumped into the ditch. When I saw the old man standing by his truck, I stopped and asked whether he needed a lift somewhere. He directed me to the community center, where a group of his friends were gathered for a memorial service. There’ll be someone there who can winch me out, he said.
It was only a quarter-mile down the road, and I was headed that way anyway, so I offered him the lift. He fidgeted in the seat, mumbled something about how he can’t believe he missed the turn. He doesn’t drive as much as he used to, he said. I wonder whether he’s fit to drive, whether he’s on meds or had a nip of morning whiskey. I wonder whether he’s anxious about the questions the police will ask if he doesn’t get the truck winched out before they arrive. For most Americans, conversations with law enforcement make the palms sweat, even if their only crime is committing an honest mistake.
In America there are two classes of people. One class pulls the trigger on a useless rifle. The other class built the gun.
Most days I don’t think about power. I drive to the office, tick items off a to-do list, drink endless cups of Keurig pods. I grab a grape C4 before the gym, sip it as I push weight off my chest. I make my way to my personal castle, listen to the recap of last night’s NBA games and smother chicken thighs with Butter Chicken sauce from a jar. Some nights I read on my Kindle. Other nights, Amber and I stream some show on one of our 4 streaming services. I sleep. I wake. I run the program again.
I wake and work and play in a sort of operating system. We call this operating system America. There are lines of code to that operating system, lines I can’t decipher. There are alligators and jackals buried in that indecipherable code. They’ve written the code, in fact, and that code is slanted in their favor.
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That being said, my hopes are anchored on the reality that somewhere, there’s a forest friend who’s willing to wrench the white rabbit out of jowls and ditches.
I’m not sure if there’s a bug in the OS or if the OS is bugged. Maybe both. Either way, I’m more often than not fearful to log in.