So let’s face it, we all knew that something was going to happen sooner or later.
Then again, it’s been happening since the beginning of time.
A process that is continuous. An ongoing re-invention, that could level any playing field.
It’s a natural adaptation to circumstances which are forever changing.
Nothing ever definite. Just infinite possibilities.
There can be no planning. The whole concept could only succeed if it was able to ‘knee-jerk’ to
overcome every hurdle it faced. The process required it to change direction at the drop of a hat,
and wouldn't be able do so, if it was already fully committed to anything.
It needed to be free. Readily available, and balanced on the balls of its feet.
Focussed, and prepared to meet any assault, and ready to counter, when the moment arrived.
So yes, we had long debated the next stage of our evolution.
A guessing game which no-one could win. When the answer finally dropped at our feet, there was not one
person who could stand amongst us, and say ‘It was just like I said it would be.’
The thing about evolution, is that it is constantly happening.
It is like the wind in the trees, throwing clusters of branches, one way, and then another. Or two metal
balls, dangling on wires, that continue to strike each other. One strikes the other, and then the other reacts;
returning the favour in reply. You see, we have managed to survive throughout the ages, by being first
able to react to situations, and then adapt to them. React, adapt, and then be ready for the next test.
So we could never stand still, and think ‘ we are here, we have made it.’ If we had, well we would
have been overcome in an instant, by the simplest of challenges. If we didn't keep moving
forward, we would have been left behind. Or lost in the dust that would consume us.
We needed to continually change, and the world would ensure that there would be more than
enough opportunities for evolution to jump in and save us.
But this? No one could see this one coming.
But then again, in hindsight, I guess there could never have really been any alternative.
So what had we envisioned?
Bigger opposable thumbs, to help operate the latest technological advances in gadgetry?
Bigger skulls to house our huge 200 I.Q. mega-brains? Maybe an extra set of limbs, so that we
could spin even more plates, in our ever increasingly busy lives? Or maybe we had finally done
away with what we saw as unwanted flaws, such as wisdom teeth, teenage acne, or period
pains. We looked at other animals in awe; would we grow wings, or gills. Flippers? Tails? Or
maybe webbed feet, third, and fourth sets of teeth, and so on. But of course these lists were just
full of the desirable, rather than the vital. We already had all the beauty that we would ever need,
and that was the first obvious hint at what our future would hold.
It seemed, more or less, that we were already well equipped to deal with most of our tasks. We
grew to face them head-on, and then we learned to live with them. They then became part of
who we were. They defined us. And yes, it’s true, these obstacles also made a difference to the
way we lived. But the core of who we were as a people, still remained.
Not everyone had ever faced the exact same test, before now. Yes, we had all been challenged,
maybe some more severely than others, it’s true, but nonetheless, we had all grown as humans.
These adaptations, had ensured that we would survive, and persist. An existence that was more
or less guaranteed; until now.
As each new year brought yet another hurdle, we had proven to be resourceful, and survived.
We left the plains of Africa, to explore, and find newer homes. But even then, we didn’t stop
moving, and we even found ways to overcome the harsh cold realities of the Arctic.
As food became scarce, we changed our diets; learnt how to farm, and even cleared forests to
provide graze-land for cattle. We used the trees, to provide shelter for our communities, and
when trees became fewer, and fewer, in number, we turned to the other natural resources of the
Earth; like stone, and metals. Finally, we would use man-made materials.
As the woodland disappeared, and the climate temperature grew, we found new ways to stay
cool, and made ointments which would protect us from the Sun’s searing heat.
And when our lives seemed at last to be fulfilled, we would build bigger, and better weapons to
protect ourselves from any potential threat, from anyone who wasn't our neighbour.
But despite all this movement, and growth, we had never changed.
Our skin colours might not be the same that they were, or our languages may still be strange to
hear, but who we were, who we are, remained the same. We might wear different garments, or
eat different foods, but deep down inside, we hadn't changed from the people we were, at the
beginning of our time on Earth.
But now there was a different threat.
A newer threat that we hadn't encountered on this scale
before. A threat that grew more apparent with each new passing year. A threat which we were
ill-equipped to deal with ourselves.
Luckily, nature came to our rescue one more time.
The answer, it seems, had been there all along.
At first this ‘curse’ was looked upon as evil. The work of the Devil. In fact, the first to evolve to our
next level of growth, spent their lives in denial. They felt ‘broken’ and ‘incomplete,’
and were shamed by their very own kin if the truth were ever to be revealed.
Who would have known that Mother Nature could have such far-seeing insight to the possibilities
that the spreading of mankind would bring to the world. A seed had been planted at the dawn of
time, and had laid dormant until the time came when it was needed to spring to life and save
us at the last. Oh yes, it had been kept alive as a few humans were hit with a sprinkling of these
seeds, but they were so few in number at first, that these few were just seen as ‘monstrosities.’
They would be burnt at the stake, drowned, imprisoned, and hung. Ridiculed, and shamed by the
society that they were created to save. But when the time came, save us they did.
You see, as we evolved through the ages, and moved with the ebb, and flow, of the tides of
change, there had been a price to pay for our irresponsibilities. We may have seemed to have
cleared hurdles at will, without any break in our stride, but with each new obstacle we faced, our
stride became a little more unstable, and if we continued on our course, we would soon fall flat
on our faces.
Yes, we had moved across whole continents, to find new places, which we could call ‘home.’
But now that there were no more places to travel to, or indeed to explore.
Our appetites grew hungrier, and with this greed we ran out of arable land to farm, or enough
space for our livestock to feed. The fruits of the Earth were becoming rarer to find, but now it
also appeared that all the man-made materials, we used to replace them with, would leave a
permanent footprint wherever we went.
Yes, we found more efficient ways to regulate our body temperatures in the Summer’s
unforgiving heat, and the Winter’s deathly cold breath, but we were damaging the world which
had given us life, and that disappearing life force was not something we had within us to bring
back, once it was gone. Lastly, the weapons we used to preserve our ways of living, became
pointed at ourselves, as the chemicals, bacterias, and capabilities grew too big for us to contain.
But despite the life threatening seriousness of all of these, man-made catastrophes, evolution
had seen something more, and had kept its greatest trick until last.
You see, it was actually the efficiency of evolution that had caused our greatest threat.
It was because it was so damn good at what it did, that we now faced the problem, that despite
our own best attempts to do otherwise, we had prospered, and grown in numbers, that were
now so vast that the world was becoming unable to support. Our population had grown,
especially in the most congested cities, out of control. Instead of allowing mankind to keep a
more manageable number, evolution had in fact enabled us to overcome all that was thrown at
us. Instead of allowing nature to trim the numbers through natural selection, and natural events,
we found newer, and more effective ways in which to survive.
So why had our evolution allowed this to happen?
It was because that is what it was there for. Its role was to ensure the continuation of us. It was
there to protect us. Global warming, famines, disease, wars; these dealt with in the same way
water rolls off the feathers of waterfowl.
But what now?
Evolution had gotten us into this hole, and had better have a master plan if we were ever going to
escape fully intact.
Of course, we were not to be let down.
In the same way a master poker player doesn't let on what they are capable of, when pressed, or
the way a sports coach will always have a Plan B, or C, for when the game starts to move
away from his grasp, so too had evolution ensured that it’s trump card had been kept till last.
Yes, our numbers needed trimming; culled, you might say.
The facts spoke for themselves.
There were too many of us to be able to continually thrive at the rate that we had been.
Disease, hunger, death. Evolution had fought hard against all of these. If it was to then take
measures to help the reduction of our overcrowded world, then it would have to do it in ways in
which it had become accustomed. It would allows life to go on, and not caused any harm.
Looking back, what we were to become had already been apart of who we were.
Ancient texts told about the ways we lived our lives, ways we had grown to look upon with
distaste. It seemed that in it’s own particular brand of madness, mankind had found a reason to
hate something that had grown out of love.
The more observant amongst us had actually took notice in the increased numbers of those
born with this ‘affliction.’ Steadily, numbers rose, and with it came an acceptance, that the
‘anomalies’ were not the work of the devil, but the outcasts were actually also ‘God’s Creatures.’
It seemed that the world of humans were now moving to a new chapter, a more than likely
temporary solution that would ensure that the human race would prevail.
So the age of Homosexuality came to be.
Unplanned perhaps, maybe a random act of coincidence, but then again it was not absolute. Not
everyone reached this new stage of growth, as the human race still needed to persist. But now
evolution had ensured that our numbers would be ‘culled’ in a way that would keep it’s
conscience clear.