The Ruling To Come

There was a rather good 'Twilight Zone' episode wherein a pair of astronauts crash-land on a planet. One, disgruntled after a lifetime of taking orders, finds a microscopic civilization and revels in the ability to play God. Like most people (and myself), he lacked the full measure of self-determination that he would have liked. He was perpetually told what to do and, I imagine, faced judgement from above. It's unpleasant and hard to accept that one's fate is in the hands of anyone else.

That reminded me of a story I've been reading about whose commonly-accepted name is far more famous: the Sword Of Damocles. A lowly official in a royal court switches places with the king, who hangs a sword above the throne. The official rapidly finds his envy replaced with an appreciation of the threats always facing the king. I guess that what I and others get from that story is slightly different, and is better expressed by the saying "waiting for the other shoe to drop". There being always some authority over us, we often can do little more than wait for what's coming to do so. When we're lucky, there's a time for us to affect the outcome, but that time is so fleeting, and we suddenly realize that was it.