The lamp towered over the corpse of the SECULAR MONK, a curved woman tapering off and bouncing back again from the light bulb to the flat bottom resting on the dark oak nightstand. The siren's call rings through the air. The corpse rises from his bed, unfurling the quilt which sought to preserve his sanctity. As his ears slowly deteriorated from the screech of the siren, he raised his hand and swiped it away for a day longer. He had won against the cousin of death for twenty years.
As all men bound by the burden of Adam do, he began his day by adorning himself in garments to cover his naked flesh. Had he been a more sentimental man, he would have reflected on his morals rather than cleaning his molars. Perhaps twenty pages passed before the secular monk was obligated to begin his work. As a Virginian, he knew well that his ancestors would have never conquered this land without the mantra of "He that will not work, shall not eat."
Unlike the monks of centuries ago, the secular monk works in solitude from a handed-down desk in his tomb. The tools of his labor are his machine and mind. His yield is the satisfaction disseminated through two monitors and an unimportant number which increments by one thousand seven hundred and thirty six every two weeks. The secular monk is monastic because he knowingly rejects the pleasantries of direct human interaction. His work, education, hobbies, family, and friends are all abstracted from him through the TCP/IP stack.