How Will We Know When It's Over?

 April 20, 2021

   It's getting closer, we can feel it, but how will we know when it's over? 

A very clever cartoon by John Hauge

in The New Yorker

   Here's how I predict we will know it's over: 50,000 people will be packed shoulder to shoulder, in a stadium waiting for the main event. Doesn't have to be a sporting event, but it probably will be.

     Suddenly, and without warning, the entire mass of people will combust with a contageous euphoria and just start cheering, at the top of their lungs. They will roar for many minutes and the people at home will be cheering with them, and they will try to start the game but the crowd will not be finished. They will be hugging and high-fiving complete strangers and on and on they will yell at the top of their lungs.

   I have a hunch this will repeat itself all over the world. That is how we'll know it's over.

"It's not over until the fat lady cries and hugs a complete stranger in the row behind her."

—A Green Bay Packers fan's specific prediction