The crowd had gathered as usual; it was a bit on the small side, but well-behaved, as one might expect under the circumstances. The official ceremony started late as the mayor had overslept and they had to begin without him. No one minded, really.
“Well, here we are,” the deputy mayor said. She looked out at her speech. As usual, she wondered why she even bothered. “Today, as we all know, is Anwii Day. A day carried forth from the memory of our ancestors, a day where we all take a holiday from work and celebrate the ideals of… erm…” she sighed, and set the speech down. “Look, folks, let’s be honest. This day was passed down as a placeholder on our calendar, we forgot what we means, we don’t know what else to do with it, and we enjoy the time off. We might as well call it Blah Day. I don’t know what else to say, really, so how let’s just go home, all right?”
There was a smattering of applause, which was a first. Then the crowd drifted away.
The deputy mayor went home and abided by one of the few traditions of Anwii Day that everyone actually enjoyed: she called up a relatively low-key show on her tele-screen and spent the next few hours binging away at it. She got through an entire season and a canteen of swoozie freeze. A personal best.
They didn’t find the mayor until halfway through the next morning. He had fallen asleep on a freighter and not woken up until two star systems and an asteroid cluster away. These sorts of things happened on Anwii Day; the neighboring planets usually understood.
And so, life rolled on.
This was written for the December 2023 Fictionistas prompt:
I thought I would focus on an emotion that’s not exactly celebratory, but which is one I suspect many of us feel after the rush of the holidays. Because hey, why not? Anyhow,
Until next time,
Michael
Hilarious. Also...a little meh is not a bad thing.