Monday and Saturday

Monday the sun didn’t shine – anywhere. Earth stopped rotating on its axis and revolving around the Sun. Rivers ceased to run, while smoke and dust and grime filled the air. Nocturnal vermin prepared to swoop up our last remaining scraps of foods, while howling mobs set each other afire in the streets.

It was all over, wasn’t it? There were no more heavyweights. Boxing was dead and gone. Klitschko and Ibragimov, with their murderously awful non-fight Saturday night, had killed them all, and civilization along with it. It was the end of history.

Then, in a barely visible ray of dim light which had not yet escaped to other galaxies, I saw some words on a television listing. There in barely legible type, in the listings for Showtime for this coming Saturday, March 1, read the words: “Boxing: Rafael Marquez vs. Israel Vazquez.”

Could this be true? Was there actually going to be a third fight between these two warriors who had put on the best fights of 2007? Was this planned show not wrecked by the worldwide destruction of everything else by the Klitschko-Ibragimov disaster?

Suddenly the sun began to shine anew. The air started to clear, the birds started to chirp, the kids started to laugh, and the engines started to hum. People smiled at and greeted each other cordially, while lovers held hands and smooched.

Life, alas, had returned to normal – the good with the bad, the beautiful with the ugly, the roses with the rot. It wasn’t all over after all, although it had seemed that way early Monday.

I guess you have to wait a bit to avoid jumping to conclusions about the end of the world.

Hopefully, after next Saturday, we won’t feel like we did this Monday.