He was eventually recaptured by Hermes and returned to the Underworld. As a punishment for his chicanery, he was given the task of rolling a boulder up a hill, only to have it roll back down again whenever he reached the top. He must repeat this endless task for all eternity.
The Sisyphus game is a storytelling game inspired by the myth, designed by Victor Gijdbers. Victor's rules are designed for a round-the table game. I have adapted them for playing online. See the Rules page for details.
See also The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus.
Sisyphus is a game of turn-based narration. One player should volunteer to begin the game; after that, other players may take turns in any order.
Joining the game
You can join the game by registering as a user, then sending a request to the moderator (Malcolm), to be given permission to post. All serious contributors are welcome.
Taking your turn
During your turn, you must post a blog entry, narrating how Sisyphus, starting at the bottom of the mountain, rolls his stone up the mountain, then sees it roll down again and goes back to fetch it. Within these confines, you are free to narrate what you will. You can either narrate the whole cycle, or zoom in on one part of it; you can add events unmentioned by the myth, or tell the tale stark and simple; you can tell a symbolic, an expressionist, a psychological, or any other kind of tale you wish; you can focus on the weight of the stone or the memories of Sisyphus' life on earth, on his moment of despair or his moment of happiness, on his actions or his thoughts - but most of all, you should try to keep your audience interested by telling the tale in a way that has not been heard before.
How do you do that? Not by being the world's best storyteller, but by putting something of yourself into Sisyphus, by opening yourself to the absurdity of the tale and trying to find out what it means to you.
Endgame
There is no endgame. Of course, at some point the game has to end, but that point has no more meaning and is chosen just as arbitrarily as the point of death where each human life terminates. The labour of Sisyphus goes ever on, even after the last game of Sisyphus has been played and long forgotten.
"So, this is it then? Push the boulder up the hill - doesn't seem too hard. Better than getting my liver ripped out by some flaming great bird, that's for sure. I'll knock this off quickly and then find someplace to have a kip. Here goes then."
*
"Ugh, what's this thing made of? Bloody heavy. Still, it rolls okay. It's just a matter of putting your back into it."
*
"Phew. This is heavy going. I could do with a break. Shame there's no way to chock this thing. I wouldn't want to let it go. Guess I just have to keep going."
*
"I reckon - pant - I must be - pant - almost - pant - half way. Got to keep - pant - going."
*
"Bloody gods! Stupid boulder!"
*
"Just. About. There. A little more... and..."
*
"Yes! Ha! Take that, gods! Thought I wasn't up to... woah. Woah! Stop!"
*
"Shit."
*
"This is going to take longer than I thought."
Nothing ever happens, nothing happens at all
The needle returns to the start of the song
And we all sing along like before
There are also those who will tell you that we live only once, one short life that ends in death, with nothing beyond. They are also wrong.
Only I know the truth: we live but one life, but we live it many times, over and over again. We enter the darkness of death, only to emerge again into the light of birth as the same squalling child we were, however many moons ago.
Most, it seems, choose to forget. They go through life happily unware that it has all happened before. They hope and they fret and they wonder about the future, as if they had not seen it all before, many times over.
Not me. I remember. Being born, growing up, all the various jobs, friends and family members who come and go. All of it. A tolerably happy life. Times of pain. All leading up to the same unexpected ending that is so now familiar to me.
It could be worse. It's an interesting tale. There are bits that I look forward to, bits that are exciting, and of course bits that I'd rather skip over. But the pages of this story keep turning at the same constant rate and every word must be read.
Details? You want details? What is the future like? What happens to me? When will I die? Or more, importantly, when will YOU die? Why bother asking me? You know the answer already. You've been there before.
But before you try to remember, consider this: Do you really want to know? Can you cope with the realisation that your choice is just an illusion? That everything you do, you've done already? Treasure your ignorance, for it is freedom.
I don't know why I bother writing this, not that I have any choice. Nobody is going to take me seriously. You will smile to yourself and think "what an imagination he has!". And you will go on with your lives, just as you did last time. And the time before that, and the time before that, and the time before that...
Nothing ever happens, nothing happens at all
The needle returns to the start of the song
And we all sing along like before
She knelt in the dirt, the sun baking the back of her dark head. She really should have worn a hat. The side of the hill she hoped to turn into a rock garden was proving to be very uncooperative. She nearly swore as the basketball sized boulder loosened and rolled back down, bruising her knee. Inspecting her newly torn fingernail, she sighed to herself. “Maybe this is pointless”, she murmured aloud to no one in particular. One hour and fifteen minutes ago she had dug into the rich earth, hoping to set the river rocks in artful arrangement on the hillside.
One hour and fifteen minutes later she had a mild sunburn and scraped up knees and hands, nothing to show for her effort. That blasted rock just would not sit right; the hill was too steep, the boulder too heavy… she just didn’t know what the problem was, it would not stay put at the top of the incline. “Sisyphus lives…”, she grumbled under her breath. “Blast but this must be a taste of how he feels.”
She sat back on her heels for a rest, listening to the birdsong filling the trees to the south. She smiled then, suddenly lifted out of her dark mood. A breeze swept past her, lifting an escaped strand of hair off her neck, sending shivers of quiet pleasure down her spine. Rock garden be damned, she closed her eyes to enjoy the summer afternoon. Her thoughts played with the hapless wretch, Sisyphus the King… Sisyphus the King. The sighing of the trees gave her a song:
Please, God, a robin, for Sisyphus the King. If he hears a robin singing he might think about the spring. If he thinks about the springtime, his task won't seem so harsh. Please send a robin for Sisyphus the King.What about a breeze? For Sisyphus the King? If he feels a cool wind blowing he might lift his head and sing. If his heart if filled with singing, his job won't seem so bad. Please send a breeze, Lord, for Sisyphus the King.
What if there's redemption for Sisyphus the King? If he hears about your mercy and your grace in everything, He could learn about forgiving and release his heavy load. Please Lord, remember Sisyphus the King.
The sun beats down.
Enarete looks up from her reading to check on little Sisyphus. There he is, chasing the beach-ball down by the water's edge. Good, she thinks, he still has his hat. All the same, they should go in soon. The sun is getting hotter and his young skin burns easily. She calls his name and beckons.
He catches his ball and turns obediently towards his mother. She smiles as she watches him toddle up the dune towards her, the oversized ball, bigger than he is, clutched between his outstretched arms. What a delight he is. It has been such a joy to spend this time with him. Tomorrow their vacation will be over, she sighs, their last for some time. She'll return to work, and he'll be starting school soon. Who knows when they'll next have time together like this?
Her melancholy thoughts are interrupted by his arrival. He smiles at her proudly, holding forth the ball. But as she reaches for it, a gust of wind steals it from his tenuous grasp and sends it whirling away down the beach. Sisyphus squeals in delight and chases after it laughing, just as he has done all morning.
She smiles. All right, Sisyphus, just one more time.
With a final heave, Sisyphus pushes the boulder up to the peak of the mountain and then turns away, ready to repeat his regular descent.
A silence stops him.
There ought to be noise, and lots of it. The thunderous crash and thump of the massive rock careening down the mountainside in its inevitable descent. He knows that sound so well. He hears it in his dreams. Instead there is nothing. The absence is shocking.
He turns back and looks. The boulder is still there, sitting where he left it perched on top of the hill, unmoving. He stares in disbelief. Minutes pass and neither one stirs.
At length he takes a nervous step closer and hesitatingly stretches out his hand. Almost, he touches the stone, but his hand jerks back to his chest before contact is made. He chews his thumbnail and thinks.
Walking in a slow circle around the rock he regards it from every angle, always careful not to get too close. It remains unmoving. He completes his circuit and stops once more, staring in blank incomprehension.
Gradually a sound comes to his ears. A soft whisper, rough and grating like sandpaper, but gaining in volume. It soon breaks forth in raucous cacophany, an avalanche of sound issuing not from the mountain but from the man.
Sisyphus laughs and laughs and laughs.
Day 24633: Pushed stone up hill. Path still wet from yesterday's rain. Saw a lizard nesting in some rocks. Stone rolled back down again.
meant that something else would have to do. But aside from pushing the dog over a cliff, he had no ideas. He stood once more, turned first to stare into the distance, back the way he had come, and then started climbing again. The dog immediately followed. Beside the track in places lay small patches of - what was that stuff? Gorse? Heather? He didn't really care, anyway. It didn't look edible, and it certainly didn't offer any shade. Perhaps a mountain goat might find it interesting, might seek it out even, but for him it was another detail in an endless cyclorama. He pretended to walk, while the scenery did the moving for him.
Further along the track now. The dog had run ahead and was sniffing something. Its tail wagged and then cocked. A couple of black birds circled above, and over the familiar smell of dust there was an odour of something else. Something else, indeed! What was that stink? It couldn't be a dead body, could it? No, this was not the story for anything like that. But it was. A quadruped of some kind lay between two rocks, its legs in the air. He realised his zoology was as poor as his botany. It could have been a sheep or a llama, something with hooves anyway. Formication - the word popped into his head. It was covered in ants. No flies on this guy. The dog was hopelessly excited, of course.
'You can't take it with you,' he said, and the dog paused in its snuffling to acknowledge the sudden break in his silence, and then resumed its investigations.
For some reason, he choose to pause here. He picked up a few stones and flung them low, out over the sloping ground. He could hear their distant clatter as they came to earth. He realised his decision to pause had been to let the dog enjoy his discovery. I must have a nice streak after all, he thought. From his vantage point the sky seemed over-exposed. He could look down at parts of it, as if he was seeing below its waistband, seeing private parts that shouldn't be shown to mortals, or immortals, for that matter. The hidden parts were paler than the rest, they saw less of the sun. He felt for a moment that the sky was undressing for him. The higher he went the more would be revealed until, at the summit, exposure would be complete. 'The naked sky', he mouthed the words. There was something attractive about the phrase, it was too good to be his invention.
He looked back at the dog, which had just begun to tug at the hide of the carcass. Incriminating streaks marked both the nearby boulders. It was time to move on.
The idea of nakedness, conquest, summitting, had assumed a sudden importance. Not only was the sky being revealed, it was also darkening, its sensuality arising. Was his mind playing tricks on him? He knew this could happen. People would hear voices calling them off the track. They would follow and become lost - to be found the following thaw in a broken river bed, miles from their destination. No, he was clear about his predicament. There was no delusion.
Reluctantly the dog had left the dead thing, and was scouting ahead, possibly looking for another. It seemed cockier than before, more independent. It was blissfully ignorant of the task. He suddenly remembered the birds. Had they remained in the sky or settled? He turned once to look, but there was no sign of them. It would be good to be a bird, he guessed. There was no such thing as 'uphill' to a bird. The wind would take you wherever you wanted to go. Ah, but today there was no wind. The air stood sentry still. It held its breath. And when he paused he could hear only one thing, the shrill ringing in his ears. Even the dog was still now, looking over its shoulder as if waiting for the next instruction.
'Run!' he shouted, and the dog did indeed take a couple of hurried steps before stopping and watching him again. Here's a plan, he decided. From here I can see as far as that rock just...there. It must be, what? Three hundred metres away? I'll count my steps with my fingers and count my breaths in my head and see what I get to. He set off, snapping a finger out of his fist every time his left foot fell, slowly counting up the breaths in a silent voice. One hundred and eighty-three steps, ninety-seven breaths. Was that good? He seemed to remember climbing expeditions when each step required several breaths. It must be good. The dog was watching him steadily now, aware that something was going on. Right, let's see how you do. He set his sights on a new goal and started counting the dog's steps, but its legs moved so fast that he soon gave up. Why a dog? Why not something useful, like a donkey, or an elephant? The dog would probably be useless against bears or wolves too, which
would always come back to him. Why on earth was that dog so far ahead? Dogs were meant to follow trails, not blaze them. Dogs dog, doggone it! They don't belong in vans. Ah, but here we are on a van together, he observed, judiciously. Getting colder, pressing on. Getting bolder, despite the dark. That dog is bolder, now. Something has emboldened it. It has been heartened.
He shook his head to snap out of the nonsense. This is what exhaustion does to you, he knew. He had been this far, and further, before. The trick is to recognise it before it does you in. Turn back, stop and wrap up warm, or eat something. He swung the pack off his back and went to pull out his food bag then paused, and in the quiet moment of evening that enfolded the scene, decided that it was time to bivouac. His sleeping bag was a good one, expensive and waterproof in its Goretex shell. He rolled out his mat and lay the pack beside it. He would get into the bag and eat lying down. Now that he was not moving he realised that it was not quite dark, only too dark to walk safely over loose rocks. He could see the horizon, faint but quite clear. The sky had been stripped almost to black but not quite.
The dog, cannily aware that food was in the offing, circled closer. It was a noisy eager beady-eyed thing in the twilight. He threw a sandwich out for it and was appalled at the noises it made. Scoffed. That was what it did, it scoffed it. He gave it another and then ate one himself. The bread had absorbed enough hydrocarbons from the Tupperware to be used as rocket fuel, he thought. He chewed contemplatively, pulping the sandwich to a wet and slimy dough before swallowing. It was a pleasure unlike ordinary eating. Every mouthful up here counts, every mouthful is useful. Every flavour is magnified. The dog wanted more. It was inching towards the half-eaten sandwich that lay in his hand. It will begin whining in a minute, he thought. At least, I hope so. What would I do if it began to snarl? It didn't bear thinking about. So, we're in this together, are we?
For an answer the dog turned around twice, in an awkward low-hipped fashion, then settled against his knees. He repositioned it with a push or two, then watched as it lay its head on its paws and watched him back. 'Dog,' he said, and its ears flickered. 'Dog,' he repeated, and it licked its lips and let out a theatrical sigh.
He drew his flask out of the pack and unscrewed the cap. Coffee was not the most practical drink to take on a hike, but it had a morale-leavening effect that outweighed the shortcomings of its energy-content. A beautiful tiredness began to suffuse his body. Within the warmth of the bag, the intoxicating aroma of the coffee in his nostrils, he felt a sudden wave of happiness. There are worse things than this. He had planned to spend a few minutes looking for easily identified stars, but almost as soon as he put his head back against his rolled-up jacket, his eyes closed and he started to sleep.
Sky was a voluptuous black woman with flashing eyes. She danced towards him and there was little he could do in the situation other than dance with her, following her lead, and disregarding the laughter that he thought he heard coming from the fringes. There was something ridiculous about a white man's body in the black of Africa, he conceded. The only right response was laughter. She clamped his body against her belly and ground her hips. He felt as if his feet left the ground and the waves of motion took him over completely. It was a dream, he realised, but a good one.
Some time in the night he woke with a start. Had he just heard a noise, or was this the usual common or garden hallucination of low oxygen, high exertion? The dog snored softly. Surely it would have been awakened too, if there had been something near by? No, there's nothing. Sleep, he told himself. He closed his eyes and let drowsiness resume its warm hold over him.
Crack! He jerked upright, and the dog leapt to its feet simultaneously. He stared into the blackness, looking in the direction of the dog's nervous gaze. There was a silhouette of something big humped against the skyline, perhaps only 10 metres away. It was so dark he could see it better if he didn't stare directly at it. It was an animal, or perhaps a person in a hooded cloak. He dismissed the idea automatically as simply too melodramatic.
Later he felt he was lying with his eyes closed, and castigated himself for falling asleep at such a moment, but then doubts began to circle, and he wasn't sure if he was awake or sleeping, or whether the figure had been part of a dream or real. He tried to reach for the dog to see if it was still beside him, but his hand would not move. A heady musky perfume filled the air and he relaxed in the knowledge that he was powerless, and that any danger was inevitable, things were out of his control now. His dreams
broke into his train of thought. In any event, things were obviously changing, even if not quite as expected. He stirred, and opened his eyes. The dog had gone, and another beast had taken its place - the wind. It had been flinging stinging sand into his face for a while now. It was shaking the sparse plants and chasing tendrils of dust between the rocks. When he stood he felt buffetted by it. The larger gusts could be heard roaring towards him across the rocks many seconds before they hit.
Up ahead he noticed a small dark figure, labouring against the slope, but seeming to make good progress. Must have passed me in the night, he thought. Unbidden, a line from a song popped out of nowhere, 'Oh, what a nght...' Oh no, he thought, I don't want that running through my head all day. 'Late September, back in '63, What a very special time for me, What a lady, what a night.' It seemed he wasn't going to have any say in the matter. He decided to count steps again, hoping that would expel the song from his mind.
It didn't. but it had the effect of distracting him from the effort of climbing, and that was a good thing. He was rapidly catching up on the figure ahead. It was a child or a woman, judging by size. He felt no apprehension about meeting such a stranger in this desolate spot. It would help to relieve the monotony, and he may even learn a little about the area. If it were not for the wind he could probably hail the other person now. But no need. The figure had turned and obviously seen him. It was giving all the signs of being alarmed. It was now clearly trying to run against the slope, and was casting backwards glances at him every few metres. Perversity made him increase his pace. Relentless. Unrelenting. He reeled her in until she was no more than fifteen metres ahead - close enough for him to hear her heavy breathing and the rattle of stones under her feet. He kept pace now, letting his own heart settle down to a sustainable rate, building up stamina for - what?
Something cruel and alien took control of him. He quickly increased his pace to a run, grabbed the woman by a shoulder and spun her round. She lost her balance and fell back against the path. She spat words at him in a language he couldn't understand, and attempted to crawl away. He stopped this very effectively by simply stepping on her long cloak, which was tied around her neck by a silver clasp. She choked and fell limply to the ground.
'Do you speak English?' he asked.
She stared at him with no sign of comprehension, only a natural fear.
'I am the beast of the mountain,' he said. 'I do as I will.'
She obviously didn't understand. He felt unfettered and immune. He really could do as he wanted. He was in a dream. He need account to nobody. Before deciding on a course of action he examined her more closely. She was dark haired and olive complexioned. She was lightly built too; quick, but no strength, he noted. She was neither particularly attractive nor repulsive. Her teeth were exceptionally white and even, however. He wondered how old she was - thirty? Thirty-five? And why was she wearing this outlandish costume of cloak, sandals, and a long dress of coarse wool? He felt around her waist for a dagger, and sure enough there was one. He jerked it free of the twine that held it in place and drew it out of its sheath. Her eyes widened in alarm. With a measured sense of how sinister his actions would appear he jerked the blade towards her and was gratified by a gasp and a spasm of fear.
At this juncture he realised that he was acting out a story, and that he ought to make it a good one. But what determined whether a story was good or bad? He knew that some would like to hear a story of ravishment, while others would be happier with a tale of moral virtue and its just rewards. Was only one option open to him, or could he make more than one thing happen? He solved the dilemma by dragging the woman to her feet, brushing the dust from her clothing and handing back the knife, sheathed, handle-first. He then turned his back on the woman and stood waiting to see what would happen next. He was allowing the story to take its own path.
He surveyed the path he had himself taken over the last few days. Many miles below he could trace the thin white line of the track he had climbed, winding left and right, but always heading upwards, always growing steeper. He felt something touch him. Was it her warm hands slipping around his waist, or was it the cold dagger pressing through his skin and into his innards? Strange that he couldn't tell the difference!
Several birds were lazily circling overhead. He watched them without thought, gradually realising that he must be lying on his back. There was a heavy weight upon him. Was it the woman's body, or the weight of his own death? And the liquid, what was that? Blood or sweat? He felt his mind drifting in a seductive reverie. This, he announced to himself, is how death comes to you. Interesting, isn't it? Yes, but it could also be a post-coital dreaminess, remember? It feels the same. How do I know these things? Well, you just do, after all. The birds continued their smooth wheeling. The wind is supplying them with a strong updraft, he noted, then noted also the trivial and incongruous nature of his observation. It is as if I am stuck between stories now, with no will to go one way or the other. I've lost all direction.
But that was not true. There was a mountain to climb. As reverie turned to pain he realised he was lying across hard boulders, and that either he would have to move or stay put. He got up and headed towards the summit. At a slight crest he turned and looked back down the path. There was a body down there, where he had been lying. It was his or the woman's, he could not tell. The column of birds stretched high into the sky. Their muffled cawing
would continue. But despite that, the fog was closing in now, and at times he had to pause, unable to see his footing clearly enough to continue. He had moved up onto a ridge earlier in the day, and since then the ridge had become steadily steeper and well-defined. At times now he clambered with a leg on either side of a jagged rock edge, the drop to each side hidden in the shroud of cold and wet fog. The rock was also cold and damp, and chilled his fingers. It had been like that for several hours now.
He found a loose stone, roughly fist-sized, and decided to drop it over the side, anxious to know just how far down the rock face sloped. This was irresponsible, he knew. It transgressed one of the basic laws of mountaineering, but he was unreasonably certain that he was now alone on the mountain. There was no-one below him, and the falling stone could not, therefore, do injury to anyone.
He gently tossed the stone out a couple of metres and immediately lost sight of it in the mist. A second or two later he heard it bounce off the rock face, a muffled clicking sound repeated twice, and then silence. Ah, he thought, only a few metres after all. But then, several more distant reports came up to him as the stone continued to bounce down the slope, each sound softer than the first, until they faded into silence. The drop was enormous, clearly hundreds of metres.
After a few minutes of now rather nervous scrambling he noticed that the mist was beginning to clear. He could see perhaps ten metres ahead, and down. Suddenly a vista opened up, he could look forwards as the ridge sloped upwards into the clouds, and turning, saw the part he had already traversed. It had felt as if he was moving in a straight line, but this was evidently not so. The ridge curved around in a perfect semi-circle behind him, and he was now travelling in the opposite direction to the one he had assumed. Without sun and without being able to see any distance, he could easily have been going in circles and not realised it. The ridge was marking the upper end of a cwm, and on the inner side the drop had been only fifty or sixty metres, and flattening out below. He was tempted to scramble down into the cwm and have a rest. The mental strain of struggling along the uneven ridge, knife-like in parts, had been considerable. It seemed unfair that he had to endure such stress, and he wondered why he did, but there was no answer to that question.
For some reason he chose not to rest. Knowing that one side of the ridge sloped only a relatively short distance down was reassuring in the circumstances, and he was able to continue with renewed confidence, keeping his weight on the 'inside', as he now thought of it.
The feeling of well-being did not last. The fog began to gather again, and the ridge began to descend. This made climbing awkward, as he could no longer reach the rock in front of him with his hands. He soon had to turn around and climb backwards, feeling down with his feet into the fog, not knowing what lay below him. The ridge was sharp, an arete really, and the holds were small. To worsen matters, it was apparent that daylight was beginning to fade. He had to take a critical decision: should he stop now and transfer his head torch from his pack to his helmet, or should he continue downwards in the hope that, despite the growing gloom, he would find a safer place to do it later. He balanced himself by pressing a knee against the rock and carefully dipped a shoulder to allow the pack to slide off his back. Its weight was considerable, and the rock was slippery. He could feel his heart thumping, and his ears were drumming to the same beat. His hands shook as he fiddled with the straps while trying to balance the pack on a small sloping shelf of rock at knee height. It slipped, but he managed to hold it for a second against the rock face with his own weight. But then he felt one of his feet slowly slipping backwards and losing its grip on the rock. He had no choice, in an instant he had let go of the pack, searched the rock in front of him for the best hand-holds, and taken them. The pack tipped away from the rock and started to fall. In slow motion he watched it tumble into the grey void below, and knew then that all his hopes fell with it. Without food, shelter, fuel, light, and extra clothing he was as good as dead already. A great lump formed in his throat and tears pressed at the back of his eyes. He gave in to self pity and sobbed twice before taking a couple of deeper breaths and forcing his mind to focus on what he ought to do now. Though his chances were almost nil, he must continue, because to stop meant to give up.
He moved further down the arete, noting with some optimism that it was becoming less acute. In places it was almost rounded, like a buttress rather than a knife-edge. This meant that he had a little more choice about how to move, he could traverse slightly left or right if the holds looked more promising, and slowly the fear seemed to subside. Despite the fact that he was still descending when he ought to be climbing, he hoped that his luck might turn. Who knows, he might even find his pack if he continued this way.
Now that it was getting dark though, his priority was finding somewhere that he could stop, and secure himself against falling. He needed either a flatter area, or a chimney into which to wedge his body. And he had to find this quickly. Any other consideration would have to wait. He secured his hands on a horizontal seam of rock and bent his knees. He let one foot slip out of its tenuous hold and stretched his leg downwards. The rock felt smooth and featureless below. He chanced a downward look, not easy as he was pressed hard against the rock face, and saw what he already suspected to be the case - the rock was devoid of all holds below. He began to traverse awkwardly, not knowing what would lie to the side. The effort of moving sideways was draining his last reserves of strength. The seam he wsa using for hand holds was thinning out. He could continue left in the hope that bigger holds were just out of sight, or he could go back the way he came. But at the moment he considered these options they were both taken away from him. His foot slipped again, and the sudden extra weight on his fingers dragged them out of their small handholds and he started to fall.
Time changed gear. His first feeling was one of regret and self-recrimination. What a waste of life, and it's all your own fault his voice said quite clearly. Next a submissiveness came over him. He knew for the first time in his life that he really no longer had any say in the matter. Gravity had taken him, and would dictate completely what would happen next. It was almost like slipping into a dream. And then the self-pity returned; he numbly considered the many nameless things he could once have done, but which were now taken away from him. Another time
and up
and up
right to the bottom
History begins to absorb you as you age. With each decade your perspective shifts back ten years; having started thinking only of the future, you end by thinking only of the past. Just before you die your mind is already embedded in history then, a moment later, you become history yourself.
But before that point, you find yourself wondering what life was like for your grandparents, and their parents. How did they talk to each other? What amazed them? What were they proud of? What did they hope for? You realise that distant historical events, like wars and disasters, were not that distant after all. Your parents and grandparents lived through them. You remember how often they talked of these things when you were small, and how tedious it seemed for them to keep going back so. It was so old-fashioned, in the most literal interpretation of that phrase.
And somewhere along the line you found, to your amusement and chagrin, that you were doing the same thing. Saying 'I remember when...' no longer elicits amazement from your audience, just a detached kind of sympathy for the older generation, who had to put up with such primitive times. People suddenly seem to assume you have first hand experience of events that took place many years before you were born. It irritates you that they know so little about things that happened only yesterday, but before they were born.
You learn to keep your mouth shut. It didn't serve any purpose for your parents to tell you how things used to be, and in revenge, the same applies now to you. Past mistakes don't serve as warnings, past successes are no longer indulged with celebration. What do you know and what did you do, anyway? Was it that different from what your parents did, or their parents before them? No, you come to the painful realisation that you are not the culmination of history, or evolution. You are simply a link, indistinguishable from that which came before and that which comes after.
Slipping from the present to the past means a loss of presence. Invisibility begins to shroud you. First you become transparent to children, then to adolescents, then to people you desire (the hardest part), and finally, process complete, you become invisible to all. No menu meets your tastes, no advertisement catches your eye, no shop sells what you are looking for, and no official has any interest in you.
Even the language betrays. New and ugly phrases replace perfectly good older ones. Stick with the old and sound dated, use the new and sound pathetic. You seek out those who share your predicament. There is reassurance in pretending together that the old is still here with us, that the past lives. You become interested in history, but have no-one to talk to about it. You once thought the voting age should be 10, now you think it should be 50. History show you are right, but there are no votes in it.
The baby boom is your only consolation. Weight of numbers will give your generation some say. No-one else is going to help you, you have to help yourself. In a world where competition is the new cooperation, take what you can, don't be content with the next generation's leftovers.
You were born into a world that wasn't yours. You leave it the same way.
Sisyphus, the ancient king of Ephyra, defies the gods and cheats death to be with with his beloved wife. Captured by Hades, the wicked Lord of the Underworld, he is made to carry a heavy load up a forbidding mountain. What terrible fate awaits him at the top?
Praise for Sisysphus:
"I couldn't put it down!" -- The New York Times
"You'll want to read this again and again." -- Guardian Weekly