Sisyphus Among the Phonies

To be returned to the living-world a second time, to have somehow outlasted mortality & death while virtually countless others remained bound by the doctrine of Hades and meta-consequential punishment... Sisyphus had to wonder why he was so fortunate. He had to examine his bones and his thoughts and the trajectory he'd carried all along.... 

Of course, much had changed while he was pushing the boulder: Women's bodies and the rights guarding the condition of those bodies had fallen in & out favor in a dizzying atmosphere -- a world of problems and conditions far more than even Persephone could account for. And workers of farms, factories and everywhere between and after had boulders of their own to push, relationships of their own to navigate and mend and grow. Sisyphus found himself permanently engaged, yet was speechless to offer any proposals. 

He -- dressed in jogging shorts, fresh sneakers and a t-shirt that read Kill The Mountain -- stopped outside an extraordinarily tall building that was a news headquarters, looking up in admiration albeit compromised with a certain pesterous doubt. He felt equally big and small. Then one -- the first of many -- man paused in their travel to acknowledge Sisyphus. "It's quite something, isn't it," said the stranger. "Makes you wonder what they're getting up to in there, doesn't it? All those windows into rooms with locked doors?" 

Sisyphus, naïve, misunderstood the man's intention: He thought the man was genuinely referring to the news, and not something else. "Do they have a lot of money?" Sisyphus asked. "I hear a great deal about money all the time." 

"Oh," said the stranger, "everyone from some queer panhandler to Elton John has money. It's how you spend it that's the biggest concern... And these guys, these guys have more money than they know what to do with." 

"What a strange position to be in," said Sisyphus exactly as the thought had entered his mind. "Is it beyond them to share?" 

The strange man's face turned pale and cold. His spontaneous vibrance had withered to something damning, to someone accused. "You can't just be promiscuous with something like that, fellow. People will take advantage of you," setting a nervous hand on Sisyphus's arm. 

Sisyphus jumped in repulsion. "What do you mean by 'promiscuous'," he asked, rubbing his molested extremity. 

"Well," said the man, "you know...you have to be careful. Men do a lot of devious things in private." 

"Should they live without privacy?" Sisyphus asked. 

"Well, no..." he added. But no other words were to follow. 

Another question began in Sisyphus's mind but he instinctively knew it was futile. He walked away from the strange little man there decomposing in real-time on the sidewalk. Sisyphus walked up to the front door of the building and began to look inside. 

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