As anyone reads The Road, one can't help but think, "What is it that took place on earth for it to just die like that?!"Let us take a few details from the book. The ashes fall like snow, one can't see the sun anymore, there are almost no traces of non-human life, and even the humans are pretty much not there for the most part. Was it a nuclear catastrophe? Was it a volcano? Was it maybe just an ecological collapse caused by the increasing acidity in the ocean?
The answer is that we'll never know. Just as the future is uncertain, the past is also uncertain. Only the present matters. Just like Christmas.
The father and the son always prepared for the future, having a pistol ready at all times in case they needed a quick and easy way out *coughSUICIDEcough*. However, when the time came, the father couldn't do anything. Even on the verge of imminent death, and even under the promise made before stating that he would never leave the son alone in the world, the man doesn't (or can't) shoot his son. You can't know the future until it hits you. It's the now. It's always the now. It has always been and always will be. Now.
Speaking of futures, did you know that there is no future tense in terms of grammar? Technically, there's only the past tense and the present tense. The future tense is just a modification of the present tense. I learned that somewhere, but I don't know where.
Anyways, after the boy wakes up one day to find that the father's body was "stiff and cold," the boy sobs for a while, until some people show up. Of course, after all that the man and the son had gone through, the son doesn't trust them yet.
"How do I know you're one of the good guys?
You don't. You'll have to take a shot.
Are you carrying the fire?
Am I what?
Carrying the fire.
You're kind of weirded out, aren't you?
No.
Just a little.
Yeah.
That's okay."
Just like that, the boy joins the other 'good guys' and decides to leave the dead body of his dad behind. Leaving the past behind, heading towards an uncertain future.
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