2BR02B

Part two in my ongoing - Beginnings series.

I've been thinking a lot about Vonnegut since his death. He was a key influence on me in my early twenties. I devoured every book of his and even illustrated mock book covers for illustration projects (I was in art school at the time). But like Philip K. Dick, another early obsession, I grew tired of the voice.
I realize now that I just needed to get away from it for a while.
These days, I delight in exposing my son to Vonnegut - he is reading him much earlier than I did. I am also rediscovering the brilliance of his work.

Recently Vonnegut's story 2BR02B was posted at Project Gutenberg.
(Read the title aloud using the word "not" for zero)
It's a stunning opening, full of the Vonnegut twist.

Everything was perfectly swell.

There were no prisons, no slums, no insane asylums, no cripples, no
poverty, no wars.

All diseases were conquered. So was old age.

Death, barring accidents, was an adventure for volunteers.

The population of the United States was stabilized at forty-million
souls.

Down to forty million from what three hundred or so? Maybe things are not so swell after all.
Here's the link to the complete text:
2BRO2B