HE WENT INTO HIDING DURING THE SPANISH FLU OF 1918
John Cronley was just an infant when he and his family headed to their bunker in 1918. Unfortunately, he chose the wrong time to rejoin humanity.
“Holy katzenjammers’ kids!” Cronley said. “My timing is the pits!”
Cronley and his parents thought The Spanish Flu would be the end of humanity and went into hiding. For the last 100 years, he’s been in an underground, waterproof bunker in Bisbee, Arizona. They had stocked the bunker with everything they needed. It had enough recycled oxygen filters, non-perishable goods, and hydroponic fruits and vegetables to last 100 years.
Feeling like he missed out on life, and close to a natural death anyway, he decided to venture out. When he finally left his protective cocoon what he saw shocked him. The world is struggling with the exact same problems as it was in 1918.
“The loneliness was driving me insane,” Cronley said. “My parents passed away about 70 years ago. My only friends were the voices in my head and a sock I fashioned into a puppet named Pola Negri.”
Cut off from any form of emerging media, he assumed the virus had taken its toll on humanity. “But my family, we’d figured out a way to beat it,” Cronley said.
A few days after his 103rd birthday, Cronley decided his time on earth was short and he wanted to see the world. He wanted to see a sunrise and sunset before his natural life came to an end. So he emerged from his bunker.
“I walk out and get a ride to the middle of the town square. No one’s there so I thought my parents weren’t simps after all,” he said. “Then I happen on a cute filly who starts yelling at me for not wearing a mask. I thought maybe it was Halloween since I lost track of time around 1942.”
WHAT NOW?
Doctors have him under observation and are amazed at his ability to survive without natural light. His Vitamin D deficiencies were at dangerously low levels.
“It’s taken a toll on his body, “Arizona State Medical Center geriatrician says. Meaney says. “But somehow he survived. He’s an extreme but shining example of the benefit of staying inside and safe during a pandemic.”
Hospital psychiatric staff are doing their best to get Cronley up to speed. They are filling him in on all that has happened in the world since he went into hiding. Unfortunately, his anger and blood pressure spiked when doctors informed him about the coronavirus epidemic.
“I was more steamed up than a kettle on a hot stove,” he said. “My only shining hope is that I wasn’t here for 2020. That sounded like it was no duck soup of a year.”
