Out of Balance or Prelude to a Fall

A man emerged from the bathroom stall. He rolled down his sleeve, concealing the bruised skin where several needles had been lodged, and made his exit. Dark circles surrounded his eyes and his shirt was tucked in only in the front. It was a fashion faux-pas that one might call a dress shirt mullet.

As he pulled the door open he was hit by a toxic miasma of flashing lights and pulsing sound. The electronic chimes and dings, the rustling of tokens and sporadic mirth were an assault on the senses, and he felt an urgent need to abscond.

A couple blocks from the casino, the streets were empty. They were littered with potholes, and tufts of grass grew through cracks in the pavement.

He closed his eyes and was briefly transported. The same street was now brick and cobblestone, bustling with opportunistic vendors and snake oil salesmen. In horse-drawn carriages, mustachioed and monocled European royalty or be-spectacled industrialists were being chauffeured about. In front of bars and inns, young boys and girls solicited patrons for their respective establishments in the hopes of bringing in tourist dollars and earning a modest commission.

He opened his eyes as a dead man walking--a ghost in a ghost town. The only sounds came from a hanging sign that broke from its chain on one end, waved violently in the wind, and slapped against a wall of concrete.

Before long he arrived at the observation deck where he took in the view. He drifted away again.

The land glaciated and thawed with the passing of seasons and epochs.

The sun swung from east to west as shadows did the opposite. Clouds raced across the sky. The trees bloomed, greened, yellowed and disrobed. All the while a mighty cataract ate through layers of stone and pushed its way across the landscape. It carved out the gorge where the power vista would be. It made a sharp turn and left behind the whirlpool rapids as it continued its recession. As it arrived to more or less its current location, he looked out over the glistening waters at the bottom of the gorge and at the roaring falls with their now unrestricted flow.

And as Niagara falls, it also rises--in tiny ionized droplets, a levitating mist painted by a neon-trimmed skyline.

Such powerful forces contrast the fragility of life--a state of balance that is the product of perpetual imbalance. What is breathing if not a constant switch between a surplus and lack of oxygen? A series of breaths. An alternating current. A chemical stasis. As a sound wave is but a series of crests and troughs, these illusions that we call equilibria are just constantly changing states, averaging out over a duration of arbitrary length. Forward and back went the dance of time.

Sometimes the pendulum swings too far. It comes back as a wrecking ball.

To his right was Nikola Tesla. On his left--Frederick Law Olmsted. There could be no balance between the exploiter and the preservationist. There was a spanning between the two, but to no one's satisfaction. The chasm was too large.

He got up on the railing of the bridge and slowly put one foot in front of the other. Muscles in his body that he never knew he had were making tiny adjustments to keep him balanced. They did this unconsciously, just as the heart beats without anyone having to give it the slightest thought. Beside him on tightropes were the Blondins and Farinis. They crossed carrying others on their backs, with wheelbarrows and bicycles, and with peach baskets strapped to their feet, trying to top the latest stunt. Crowds gasped and cheered from the overlooks.

He stood on the railing of the bridge with arms outstretched, leaned back, and let his body go limp. He was only the latest sacrifice to the Great Spirit of Niagara.