Greetings. I am a dead bat as you can see ... unless, of course, you are blind like me. My name is Vlad, obviously, and I dropped off the black branch of some riverside tree onto this busy bike path made of tarmac and dust. It may appear as if I am only sleeping as the old tombstones used to say, but I can absolutely assure you, gentle reader, that I am indeed one hundred percent deceased and departed. Is cold-blooded mammal Heaven echolocatable, I wonder. Does anybody know? Can anyone point me in the right direction at least.
One of the major disadvantages of laying in a shallow bike-path grave is the better than even chance I have of being run over and squashed by some be-goggled, knobbly-kneed racer who daydreams of competing in the Tour de France. Still, if I am flattened by the weight of rider and ten-geared machine, my crushed self will at least be provided with an amusing costume for Halloween since I can then go to parties as "The Monster Mash." That's just a little an example of what we in the nightfight trade call black humor.
So, this is Vlad the Impaler's younger (and unluckier) brother Vlad the Impaled. This daily walk you take, with camera at the ready, is akin to Sherman's March. All death and destruction.
But, oh, and thanks for the glint of sunshine reflecting off of the tarmac. A change from the forlorness of the previous sequence. Darkness soon must become light. Thinking about your photographic trajectory, something living (sorry, not counting the wild brain!) will soon show up in a photo.
Posted by: DarkoV | October 20, 2005 at 10:14
It's my morning walk to work. There is ALWAYS something dead hanging around the route I take: nature red in tooth and claw in the AM.
Winter's coming so don't hold your breath for living things any time soon.
Posted by: stephenesque | October 20, 2005 at 10:21
Is a self-portrait on the Route To Work a possibility? Heck (and gosh and wowza), you could even incorporate Halloween into the photo by taking a shot of yourself in full dress regalia strolling down Dim's Way.
Posted by: DarkoV | October 20, 2005 at 11:38
These photographs are not what Burke intended by the term "the democracy of the dead," but might have had something like the meaning Darwin would have intended if he had used the phrase.
This is The Underworld, friends. The noisy if negligible temporary inhabitants of the present have no place here. Not yet.
So. Have a nice day, all.
Posted by: Bleak Mouse | October 20, 2005 at 15:09
Cold-blooded heaven, nor any other heaven, cannot be located by echoes, you dumb bat, but only by sighs and whispers, which you made no attempt to learn of or about during your futile life; so therefore, suffer. Maybe somebody will pick you up and put you in an incinerator, instead of taking pictures! But that is humanity for you. (Most people don't get to heaven either, I hear.)
Posted by: Mortimer Shy | October 20, 2005 at 15:14
What a beautiful little creature.
Posted by: Quicquid | October 20, 2005 at 20:01
Is it possible that this little bat is not dead, but is instead on the ground, face first, crying about not winning the Powerball? Or maybe his batgirlfriend dumped him for some manbat with bigger fangs, or perhaps a bigger wingspan (you can tell things about a manbat by the length of the wingfingers)? This looks like a bat with some serious emotional issues, even if he is, indeed, dead.
Posted by: Misspent | October 20, 2005 at 22:12
It looks rabid to me. Did you add it to your bat collection?
Posted by: rannva | October 21, 2005 at 01:26
Call me soft, but I feel sad for the poor wee thing.
Posted by: Andraste | October 21, 2005 at 09:17
Mortimer: I think all of heaven is just echoes, echoes of wishful thoughts and human hopes.
Misspent: Get some real balls-out, uber-cock rock albums and listen to them instead of that sentimental disco schmalz you drip-feed your ears with.
Andraste: It's a bloody bat! A rodent with wings! Dracula in a fur coat! Don't feel sorry for it. It would bite you if it could.
Posted by: stephenesque | October 21, 2005 at 09:23
Heaven is indeed echolalable. Echolation involves triangulation, one of the points of the triangle being heaven (plus earth plus individual bat). All you want to find out by this process is where you are, after all. Where on earth, or where in heaven.
Posted by: janetissimo | October 21, 2005 at 09:30
That's a misconception. Much maligned, bats eat their weight in mosquitoes every night.
Bats = my friends.
Mosquitoes = my most bitter enemies.
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Posted by: Trevor Carpenter | November 03, 2005 at 23:33