If You're Reading This: You Found Earth.

I’ve been wondering for some time now about the legacy we humans will be leaving behind, should the Bible-thumpers or crystal-rubbers be correct and the world comes to a sudden catastrophic end a week from Friday. What will future civilizations—or even aliens—discover and learn of our tumultuous past and present?

So I have decided to take it upon myself—no thanks needed—to explain a few things, should the treasure trove that is the internet be discovered in some capacity, and they happen to find this piece between the smut and brain rot.

First of all… Excuse the smut.

Secondly, please, do not mind the ever-upset white knights taking it upon themselves to find every little thing they could possibly be offended by—or at least make sound offensive—on behalf of others, purely out of the goodness of their own hearts. Bless them. They mean well, but they have the emotional intelligence of an overheating cellphone battery. (I’m sure you dug up a few of them so far, so no explanation needed.) And yes, we were all aware they were putting on these displays of petulance to counteract their own internal struggles, but they could be entertaining from time to time, so we let them be.

Thirdly. If it seems counterintuitive that a group of people would run around causing destruction and inconvenience, all the while demanding peace and coexistence—that’s because it is. We are aware of this societal malfunction, believed to be caused by a severe lack of “no’s” in early childhood leading all the way into adulthood, sadly. Attempts to correct this were unfortunately cut short by the distinct bellow of “yeehaa’s” and “Привет’s,” followed by a cacophony of blinding flashes.

Fourthly. I know the place looks terrible. We are very well aware of the endless damage we’ve caused to our lovely home, with no real excuse other than to prosper in a system we ourselves created. You’d think we’d just change the system, right? Oh, how foolish you are. Can’t be done. We did corner off a few areas to serve as viewing spots and campsites, though. Just to give our guilt-ridden consciences a couple days' rest—for a per-person fee.

Fifthly. I’m sure you’ve discovered the buried tablets by now—the ones containing the latest and greatest version of our own homegrown artificial intelligence? Yes, we created something to think for us, as we’d become tired of thinking for ourselves. I mean, hell, we got tired after only 10 minutes of thinking about what pointless activity we’d be wasting our precious time on before the grave next. I think you’ll find that indecisiveness has led to a vast majority of our past turmoil. That and oil—long story. It’s really too bad it had to end before we birthed our own race of sentient machines. All the available media (of the time) on the matter seemed to suggest it would have been a hoot and a half.

Sixthly. Yes, for all our technological advances, our progress in the biological sciences, curing diseases left and right—some of us still believed in mythical wonders. We were young, as a species. What do you expect? Barely out of our infancy, our minds were still fragile and hungry. With enough poking and prodding, we could be made to believe anything. Literally anything. Now, this led to some unfortunate events in our past, but we also forgave. (Never forget!) Given enough time, I’m sure we would’ve found answers that satisfied most—if not all. Lest we forget, you can’t please everyone.

Seventhly. War. Ugh. Good God, y’all…

And lastly. If you are to take away anything from this dig, let it please be this:

We tried.
Through thick and thin.
Through hell and high interest rates—we tried.

Let our victories and successes not be overshadowed by our monumental failures.
Let our—perhaps forgotten—potential not be buried under our arrogance and incompetence.
Let not our innate ability to self-destruct eclipse our willingness to help and survive.

We have wronged so many, for so long.
But we also brought ourselves, each other, this far—together.

Now, should it all come to an end over oil, land, politics, or Twitter...

Remember us for the good, the art, and the lovely.

We tried.