Ernest Samuel Llime - Short Stories

Western Long Island
Ernest Samuel Llime - August, 2010 - LI highways

For centuries people have been wondering about lost continents like Atlantis or Mu, lands that time forgot, lands in the center of the Earth and so on. I would like to point out that sometimes, these forgotten mythical places may exist (or may have existed) right in your back yard, so to speak. Let me direct your thinking processes towards one such place.

When you drive around NYC you see lots of signs directing you to Eastern Long Island. But there are no signs for Western Long Island and you do not hear anyone mentioning that forgotten land. I became intrigued by this seemingly unbalanced geographical anomaly. It is absolutely inconceivable that the Eastern part of an island, could exist as a singularity, totally without its counterpart, The Western Island!
I did some research, pieced together my findings, and I have come to this astonishing conclusion:
Western Long Island was once as real as Eastern Long Island is today. As a matter of fact I believe that it still exists
in some kind of dusty, unvisitable dimension. All of my sources are in total agreement about the basic facts that I will now reveal to you, that is with exception of the chronology of it all. One source insists that as recently as 1948, that magnate, philanderer and secret murderer (according to "The Cat's Meow") Wiliam Randolph Scott, has actually maintained a very large estate on that part of the island.
The roots of it all are somewhat shrouded in mystery, but it seems that about 2 or 300 years ago, some of the classiest of Boston society, decided that Beantown was becoming too crass for their stratospheric highnesses. They quietly moved their affairs and their residences to Western Long Island. Please keep in mind these were "THE" most aristocratic elite in the country. Why their accent was so so nasal, that me and you would probably not understand even half of what they were saying. That, may have eventually, led to their downfall. Western Long Island was separated from Eastern Long Island by a very narrow isthmus, allowing only a narrow two lane road as the only connection between the land masses.
Many of the lower classes traveled this road, because there was lots of menial work that needed to be done. You know, cooks, valets, gardeners, governesses, nannies, au-pairs, chauffeurs etc.

Anyway, here's where we get back to that nasal part. As our group of aristos had less and less contact with the rest of the world, the nasality of their accent became more and more pronounced, to the point that it started affecting the size of their nostrils which became larger and larger and larger. As a matter of fact, the size and sensitivity of one's nose became a mark of distinction influencing the desirability of a proper life partner. As their nostrils grew their speech became more and more intelligible to outsiders. These "aliens", speaking a language that was impossible to pronounce with only your average nose were not even making an effort to be understood. They didn't seem to care about worldly affairs and after a while a "Gulliver's Travels" fan dubbed them the new Houyhnhnms. Less and less menials frequented Western Long Island because they could not understand what these strange people, with the otherworldly noses were trying to say to them. Eventually, everyone would just drive past the fork to Western Long Island and go about their own business.

It is said that William Hearst was the last outsider to set foot on Western Long Island. He was not one of them, but being so rich and influential he had managed to keep his place for a long time. Of course he was rarely there and when he was, he usually came and went with his own very large entourage, not at all mingling with the Western Long Islanders. Be that as it may, he may have been overheard saying that the place looked totally deserted with not a soul around.

The road to Western Long Island was quite quickly covered with weeds and the entrance to it, that no one used anymore anyway, was hidden by the trees and vegetation that border all of New York state's highways. The last few native Eastern Long Islanders that had set foot on that other part of Long Island have since passed on to a different and hopefully better world. No on knows what became of the new Huoyhnhnms and how they all had seemed to vanish according to Hearst. There are a few theories, mostly too ridiculous to recount. I will however mention my favorite one:
As their nostrils evolved, they were of course used more and more to make sounds of derision and disdain giving rise to a new and otherwise never heard of general psychosis. Basically, the Huoyhnhnms became so annoyed and belligerent that they snorted each other.
The one grand dame with the most prolific schnozz of them all, eventually died of chronic alienation.