TOO far did I fly into the future:
a horror seized upon me.

And when I looked around me.
Behold, there time was my sole contemporary!

Then did I fly backwards, homewards – and always faster.
Thus did I come to you: you present-day men,
and into the land of culture.
For the first time I came eye-to-eye to see you,
with lively interest: truly, with anticipation have I come.

~*~

But how did it turn out with me?
So shocked I have yet to stop laughing!
Never has my eye seen anything so motley-colored!
I laughed and laughed,
while my foot still trembled,
and my heart as well.

“Here indeed, is the home of all the paint-pots,”
– I said. With fifty patches
painted on faces and limbs
— you sat there to my astonishment,
you present-day men!

And with fifty mirrors around you,
which flattered your play of colors,
an endless repetition
of your pastiche of colors !

Truly, you could wear no better masks,
you present-day men,
than your own faces!
Who could – recognize you!
Written all over with the characters of the past,
and these characters also penciled over
with new graffiti-characters
— thus you have concealed
yourselves well from all decoders!

…You seem to be baked, out of colors
and out of glued scraps.
All times and all peoples gaze multi-colored
from your disguise;
all customs and beliefs speak multi-colored
from your every gesture.

anyone who strips away the veils and wrappers,
and paints and gestures,
would just have just enough left
to scare the crows.

~*~

Truly, I myself am the scared crow
that once saw you naked,
and without paint;
and I flew away
when the skeleton ogled at me.*

Thus Spake Zarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche, trans. by Thomas Common, Part II The Land of Culture, page 117

This is a story about manipulating time, shuttling to a future, then to past time, finally to land in the present with the ability to see everything with fresh eyes. Certainly we are embedded within our own time, quite incapable of comprehending what we’ve become.  The pastiche, a decoupage of bric-a-brac salvaged from a flea market of history, ideas and attitudes that we’ve cobbled into our identity. This identity (of which we are quite proud) we call: culture.

This is another tale of how a time traveler might view Americans and our present day 21st century culture.

This is us!

Why would any sane individual consider life without music? This one is guaranteed to inspire: What’s So Funny by Elvis Costello.

*I have exercised a writer’s freedom to substitute contemporary terms for some of the obsolete language in the translation.