I guess it doesn’t matter if you have 70 years or 99. It always feels too soon. I made it to 96 years on Gods green earth. I can hear the birds chirping outside. It’s a lovely spring morning, mid 60°’s, the sun shining through the drapes. I can see the American flag waiving above the mailbox from where I’m laying. I’ve lost my appetite. No hunger, just a tad thirsty. I can hear the teapot start to whistle. My wife, children, grand children, and great grandchildren enter the room, one by one, to say their goodbyes. They all see my time here is short. My life force is slowing ebbing away. I take my last opportunity to say a blessing over each one of them. We say a final prayer and the family starts to sing Amazing grace. The teapot whistles louder. My wife comes in close. I say “I can see Jesus babe! He’s like a pure white light surrounded by angels.” She kisses me as a tear drops from her eye. The teapot now screaming loudly, followed by a huge explosion. I snap back to reality as the dirt and debris fall into my foxhole. The teapot whistle turns out to be another mortar. I wipe the blood from my brow, thinking back to the day when I went to check the squirrel traps, times were tough under the Harris administration and food was short, and came back to the note: “My Love, The people from homeland security are here, they said since we refused the vaccine we will have to go to the quarantine camp. The train leaves at noon. Please hurry back. I’m scared.” That was the last contact I ever had with my family. I later heard about the horrible and evil things they did to them. It made Hitler and the Nazis seem like a child’s birthday party at Chuck-E-Cheese. Gas chambers and furnaces would have been a more peaceful end compared to what they saw. Another whistle. Another mortar. Another explosion. They are getting closer now. I can hear them screaming in Mandarin. They are almost on top of me. I load the last five scavenged rounds into my rifle. I poke my head out of the foxhole. I can see the whites of their slanted eyes. With my last bit of strength I shove what’s left of my lower intestines back into my body and jump over the berm squeezing the trigger as I scream “DIE COMMIE PINKO SCUM!!!”

Fade to black.