Death on the Internet
I saw a single-celled organism die today. The microscopic thing was filmed in its final seconds. Shaped like a pinto bean, he had hundreds of legs running along the concave end. These legs moved methodically, slowly. And then, as in all good movies, tensions arose. The poor fellow suddenly let out a bunch of his insides. First from one end and then the other. It was as if he puked and shit all at once. This changed his behavior. The army of legs began to move frantically, as if he realized death was approaching. The membrane seemed to recover but his paddling indicated that all was not well. The microscope's lens followed his trajectory overshooting slightly then recalibrating. Losing focus then gaining it back again.
I could not look away. His struggle was strangely human. It was like watching the final agonies of a man whose organs were failing him. It was the death of Ivan Ilyich. The creature was swimming in spirals, sending him back to where he was at the start of the footage. A desperate swim back to his origin. Where else was there to go? He was in an ocean the size of a droplet; his death was proclaimed in the title of the film.
And then, as Mr. Ilych circled back, without warning, the membrane around him disintegrated. The thin wall that delineated him from the rest of the universe fell first in one region and then suddenly everywhere else. His legs, desperately swimming a moment ago, released and floated away. The little circles within him spilled into the white sea. He is remembered, perhaps, by his peers and, certainly, by me.