Billy Tanner

The inside is so inviting.

Or anywhere that’s secluded, really. It takes no effort. You can just bury your head in something, and you don’t have to worry about anything.

But you can’t stay that way forever.

You want to come out and meet people, but how can you? They all know each other well. You feel like an outsider, you don’t fit in.

You don’t belong there.

But then half of them vanish, replaced with strangers. People you’ve never met. People who don’t belong here either.

And suddenly you’re no longer the only outsider, everyone is. In fact, you feel more included. You have knowledge and skills that people don’t know about, that they haven’t seen before.

You feel needed. More than you ever did before.

So you spend time with people, get to know them a bit, get to help them out. But something’s strange. And it’s not with you, or with the people, but something deeper. Something fundamentally off with the universe.

It’s far bigger than any of us realised.

And, in truth, it’s humbling. It’s more than we could ever have imagined.

So why not go out and explore all the world you can? You’ll never make it to the Whale, through the skies like a Sentinel, but why not go as far as you can? The world’s far too big to waste with pointless politics and squabbling.

Pick up a skill, or two, or three, or four. Learn something new, see something different. It really doesn’t matter, it’s so small and insignificant in the grand scale of the cosmos, so why not have a good time? Why waste away worrying about something other people don’t care about?

And all of a sudden, the inside isn’t as inviting as it once was. You made it outside.

– Billy Tanner

By Harry W.