The Cables Stuck Too Deep

written by Billy Gardner McIntyre

illustrated by Rachel Olivia Alden

I miss the days when I wondered what people did with their time. It seemed they used so little of it for watching cartoons or reading books or making little computer programs, which was how I used all the time I could steal away for myself. People to me seemed hard to know. I would picture them sitting idly at their dinner tables. In my mind's eye, they would be unsure what to do next after they cleaned their plates. They might remain there with blank faces for a full hour before they went outside or turned on 3rd Rock from the Sun.

Now I know what people do with their time, and part of me wishes that I didn't. People today have thick, thick cables that run directly into their bodies. If you look closely, they walk differently because of the cables. They bump into things more. Wherever they go, the cables go too. The cables bring them all sorts of things: they bring excitement, they bring fun, they bring updates about loved ones. The cables also bring updates about the world. They bring thoughts sliced and diced into tiny pieces ready for people to think. A lot of those thoughts are upsetting. So when people seem mad or sad or afraid or confused, I always suppose now that it isn't because something bad has happened to them, but because something bad has happened in one of those updates.

It used to be that when someone seemed mad or sad or afraid or confused, I always had to ask why. It used to be that I never knew what a lot of the people closest to me found interesting either. I would have to ask them. I knew they didn't find the same things interesting that I did. If I wanted to talk to them, I couldn't talk about the things that I liked like history, or math, or Star Trek, or this book that I was reading, or this computer program that I was making, because none of those things would get their attention. I didn't know what would get their attention because I didn't know what they did with their time.

Now that I know what people do with their time, it's easy for me to get their attention. Now I always know what people are scared of and what they're angry about. I can just plug into one of their cables and see for myself. Then I know: everyone is thinking this thing or that one. They feel this way about it. They like this. They don't like that. Something happened, and it was someone's fault, and that's bad. I don't have to wonder and don't have to ask.

The problem is that it's a lot easier to move a problem than it is to solve one. Twenty years ago I was a weird little kid who was interested in Isaac Asimov, Thornton Wilder, black holes, World War II, p-scores and t-scores. I just wanted to know, if you people weren't interested in those things, then what were you interested in? What were you thinking? Now that I never have to wonder even for a minute, thanks to the cables, what people are thinking, I kind of miss how grand a mystery it was that all I could picture everyone doing was staring off into oblivion and waiting for their next meal. No one ever stares off into oblivion anymore. They can't. All these damn cables get in the way.

I would say that for my sake and yours, maybe you should take the cables out and go back to staring off into oblivion after dinner (or whatever you were doing). You would never have to get any of those nasty updates ever again. You would miss the entertainment at first but after a while you would remember just how much fun you had doing all the things I couldn't guess you did and thinking all the thoughts I couldn't guess you'd be thinking.

If you'd rather that I know ahead of time all the things you're going to think, the cables will always be there for you to stick them back in.

September 15th, 2025