The Opening Post T.O.P.

         It's not considered unusual to check the obituaries in the newspaper every day. They say you'll die young if that's the first thing you check each morning, but no one really believes that. What is considered unusual, however, is to check the obituaries from past newspapers in the local library and find your name, your birth date, your widow listed. Your own death date, printed in a newspaper that was published and accordingly dated over fifteen years ago.
         But here it was: Reuben Conway died at age 66 of pancreatic cancer. He was an Italian chef at Buca di Beppo for 41 years. Married at age 17 to his wife, Margaret, he lived with a sense of--
         This was obviously a mistake. A fabricated issue. I wasn't even close to 66--37, in fact!
        "Is this some kind of sick joke?" I demanded from the information desk associate, thrusting the laminated copy toward her face, "That's me." I touched my hand to my chest. "I'm Reuben Conway. I work at Buca di Beppo! I'm not dead!"
         The thirty-something-year-old woman was bewildered and made nervous by my vigorous arm motions and raised voice.
         "Sir, I'm sorry, but I don't know what you're talking about. You're trying to tell me that this newspaper's wrong? That this…" She glanced at the paper. "…1994 issue is, what, false?"
        "Yes! Yes, that's what I'm saying! Do I look dead to you?"
        "Sir, please calm down. You're yelling and this is a library. People are trying to--"
        I was beginning to get hysteric. "Calm down?" I scoffed. "You can't tell me to calm down! Why should I? The woman who claims to be my wife is in her seventies!" My hands were shaking. "And she thinks I'm dead! This is all wrong! I don't even know how I got here! I don't live in this part of Philadelphia!"