Secret liveless

I look to my right and I see a role of butcher paper. I wonder what it sees. It'll all be posters some day, about government most likely. I wonder what sort of life that is. Looking forward to see only a brief life as a colorful drawing used only once to define some concept. Perhaps not so bad. Such a short life may give reason to enjoy every day while you can. But it'll never know, and I'll never tell it. Some things must be discovered on one's own.

I look at my watch. It's shiny, black, and new. Six hands, it has, all ticking away to some unknown pattern. I wonder, do the hands tick time or do they simply sadly constantly tick? What sort of life is that? An easy one perhaps. A genius one for sure. After all, who else can keep time accurately in their head? A lonely one I'd say. Strapped to a wrist for someone's own personal use, for years sometimes. Afterall, watches don't have to die.

Does a ruler know it can measure? Maybe it only knows that people can use it to measure, but doesn't understand the concept itself. Maybe it finds ways to measure with people. Maybe it knows nothing of numbers, but can take the measure of a person's soul. Wouldn't that be nice. To see all that someone is and assign it a value, not necessarily numerical, but to rank everyone in one way or another. I wonder how it would rank me. How does my ruler measure me while I measure?

A hole-punch, now there's a sad world. your only mode is up and down and all there is to do is put holes in paper. Perhaps it feels important. What other thing could provide such a service? It's not a good life, but it's a respectable life. If it could walk, it would hold its head high. Always in the up position. I don't envy the hole-punch.

A chair, among the trash men of the object world. Someone's rear end, it's there to support, and nothing intentionally more. But a chair can support anything. You can stand on it, place things on it, use it for a blanket fort. It's versatile beyond its conception and that's perhaps a comfort to it. Chairs don't want to be sat on or stood on or placed under or pushed in, but to hold a blanket fort is a special thing. They wait every day for when something enjoyable will be placed upon them. They're like people, they just want their 15 minutes, to think and hope only for a better life. They wish they could be tables.

Tables, now they have a life. You can place anything on a table, and they help to move the world along. Something is always being said around a table, and it's always important. I wonder if it knows how lucky it is. The greatest things in history have occured around them, but they probably don't appreciate their station. Years of being around such importance gives one a swelled head and one no longer understands one is only lucky to be there. Tables are probably snobbish.

I feel sorry for trash cans. Never to be loved, never to be appreciated, never to know joy. Of all objects, they are the most dehumanized. They will only ever look forward to waste reception and the potential foot-stool now and again, though that's unlikely. I'll bet they can't cry at night. They can only sit, with their mouths open, and sigh. And the world turns around them, so sadly forgotten. I wish I could help the trash cans.

What does a book think? Surely its knowledge is limited, despite showing something so vast. it shows emotions and facts and life and inanimacy and it's a different sort of life. I wonder if it comprehends what it says or does it simply spout it to anyone willing to read it? Books are among the dumbest of objects, never to know anything beyond themselves. I don't envy books.