2. The Existent Moment

The “existent moment.”  That’s what Kafka wrote about, his characters search and their ability to obtain it, an escape from the monotonous void of their already dead life. I always thought it was supposed to be something sublime, this “existent moment,” though Gregor makes me think otherwise.  I read about Gregor twice.  Once in high school and again in college.  The German version added more gruesome details, like the filth and the fleas.  I figured the Victorians probably cleaned up the English version in the same way they sterilized the Grimms’ Fairy Tales and sex.   Anyway, maybe for Bacon and Omelette, their transformation into beetles might offer them a chance of finally reaching an “existent moment.”  Instead of Gregor’s dad throwing rotten apples him, the frat brothers could throw smashed beer cans at then.  Those idiots do it to girls all the time.

Read this story in its entirety