Patriot Realm

_{Black holes, time warps and wormholes may be understood only by physicists, but they exist in everyday life.  As I become older, my encounters are on the increase.  I fear I may eventually be swallowed up.}

_{An actual black hole is formed when a star collapses at the end of its life, and gravity is so strong that everything around is sucked in and nothing can escape, even light.  The nearest one known to astronomers is 1500 light years away, which means that it takes light travelling at 300,000 kilometres per second 1500 years to reach us.  They are however around us.}

_{A common occurrence is that which I refer to as the shopping hole.  Whenever I am shopping in the local supermarket and become separated from my wife, I experience a feeling of deep despair.  Although the aisles are wide and well lit, I am invariably unable to find her.  The shopping hole has devoured her.  I try three ways to find her.} 

_{The “end method” is to walk along the end of the supermarket and look up the aisles. This always fails. The “aisle method” is to traverse all the aisles, clockwise and anti-clockwise. Ditto.}

_{The third and final is the “phone method”.  I call her on her mobile, to be informed that she is near the ice cream freezer -which I have just passed twice.  I return, and the hole regurgitates her.}

_{My home abounds with the phenomena. They seem to have an affinity for objects such as reading glasses, or car keys.  They seem also to be influenced by time as a parameter, no doubt being related somehow to e=mc². The closer one is to dashing off to an important meeting or appointment, the more likely things are to be swallowed up. The harder one looks, the more unlikely the objects are to be delivered up.  It is only when the time is irretrievably late, that the holes deliver up their prey.  The objects may re-appear in unlikely places, such as under the table, or between cushions on the couch.  Sometimes, when the cosmic forces are feeling particularly playful, the objects may even reappear in the last place in which they were put down, or in one's pocket, or in one's hand, or in the case of glasses, on one's head.}

_{The phenomena may occur anywhere, and at any time.  Once, I parked my car in a busy car park and took great care in remembering the floor and the bay number.  When I returned, try as I would, I could not find the car.  It had been devoured.  It was only hours later, footsore and exhausted, that the cosmic forces returned my car.  They were feeling frolicsome and delivered the car on the same floor, and in the same bay, but in an identical car park on the other side of the  road to the one in which I had been searching.}

_{And then of course there is the famous Dark Emu hole.} 

_{During a period of over 50,000 years the aboriginals developed a civilisation which would put the Egyptians or Aztecs or Incas in the shade.  There were highways criss-crossing Australia, agricultural fields and pastures as far as the eye could see, and of course emu drawn chariots.} 

_{There were great cities, with the most majestic Dark Emu,  being about 400 kilometres south-west of the present Alice Springs. For some unknown reason, on the arrival of Captain Cook, the entire city of Dark Emu was swallowed by a giant black hole.}

_{A humungous vortex then swept the land sucking everything into the hole, which was then stoppered by a great red cork from outer space, later to be known as Ayers Rock.  Those lucky enough to escape were left with nothing but their boomerangs.}

_{I thought I had emailed this offering in to Monty earlier, but it’s not in my Sent Items.  It must have been swallowed by a black hole.  That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.}