Foto

He had deliberately let the rose dry out so that he could take a melancholic photo. He watched with amusement as life slowly drained out of it. The leaves became browner with each passing hour and it hung its head. Soon there was nothing left of the grace it radiated when it stood in the garden. Its roots were buried deep in the ground and it was surrounded by other plants of the same species, all glowing in yellow. It almost seemed as if each of them was shouting: "Look at me, I'm the most beautiful of them all". And because each one shouted it, it seemed almost meaningless that they shouted it at all; none of them were like the others and yet each was special in some way.

But he wanted a photo, and that's what he was going to get.

He had torn off the rose that towered above all the others and had shouted the loudest. It is the fate of flowers that those that appear the most magnificent are plucked the quickest. He deliberately left his chosen one lying between hot sofa cushions, he didn't want to wait long. He couldn't wait! He could already feel how countless people had come up with the same idea in the last few seconds and, while he waited, masses of pictures of yellow roses were uploaded. Everyone is faster than you in this world and if you're not careful, you're irrelevant from one moment to the next.

While the rose was wilting, he had wasted a thought or two on a phrase that he could slap under the photo. It had to be explosive; sound as if it summarized the entire world in one sentence. Nobody wants meaning, they want entertainment. Nobody would think about it or even make connections. He gave them a perfect illusion to make them believe that they had enriched their lives.

He took the photo, added a quote he had found on the Internet and sent it out into the world.

He threw the rose into the plastic bag with the other garbage.