Monday Rewrite: A Sticky End?

The Meteorite came close. Not close enough to do any damage, but close enough to have consequences. The next morning, as folks woke up, they wouldn’t have sensed anything unusual. Not immediately. But the moment they began discarding litter the more diligent among them might have spotted strange happenings.
Everything took root.
Sweet wrappers tossed from passing cars. Damp. mangled chewing gum spat from lips in the high street. Crumpled cans, running with the last drips of drink. Ketchup spattered fast food cartons. Anything thrown away. The earth seemed to exude a strange magnetism. Nothing blew into neighbourhood gardens or bounced into the hedgerows. Things landed and stayed where they were. Then a kind of melting took place, as the earth absorbed a fraction of each piece of litter.

Within days the first chewing gum trees were a few inches high. Fast food carton bushes were blocking the pavements. Twisted metal drinks-can weeds were growing out of the gutters and piercing the tyres of passing cars. Anyone brushing against the chewing gum trees soon knew about it. They arrived at work with their sharp suits tacky with sodden strings of half chewed gum. Dry cleaning bills rocketed. Dry cleaning stores boomed. Teams of gardeners were employed to ‘get out there and do something about it quick’ but the litter trees were not easily uprooted. And they were still increasing in number. The smell of stale burgers and old ketchup was becoming unbearable. New laws were brought in to prevent the population discarding any more litter and costly advertising campaigns were broadcast. But many ignored them. So more and more people were employed on clean up missions. The government budget soared so taxes were increased. And the problem grew worse and worse. Many didn’t believe the issue was a serious one, many thought it was caused by aliens, while many more just didn’t care. And before long everyone was broke and the planet was drowning in mangled, spiky cans, soggy, sticky gum and stale burger fumes. The end was surely nigh.

The Lord God placed people in the Garden of Eden to tend and care for it.
Genesis 1
The earth is the LORD’S, and all it contains, the world, and those who dwell in it.
Psalm 24 v 1

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