I can explain the intricacies of the Punic Wars in three different dead languages, and I can derive the equations for a stable wormhole on a cocktail napkin. I am a master of the violin, a scholar of the lost libraries of the East, and a living encyclopedia of human failure. I am also, as of ten minutes ago, completely unable to figure out how to operate a touch-screen kiosk at a McDonald's.

"Sir, you just have to press the 'Order' button," the teenager behind the counter said, his voice dripping with a mixture of boredom and pity.

I stared at the glowing screen. To me, the interface was a chaotic jumble of neon colors and illogical prompts, a primitive attempt at communication that felt like trying to speak to a brick. I had survived the fall of the Roman Empire, but I was being defeated by a medium-sized fry.

My name is Max. I have lived for a millennium, and the great joke of my existence is that the more I know about the universe, the less I understand about living in it.

I spend my days in a small apartment in Queens, surrounded by first-edition books and a telescope that can see the rings of Saturn. I am the most educated man in the city, and yet I am a social pariah. People don't want a man who can tell them that their favorite philosopher was actually a plagiarist; they want someone who knows how to use a smartphone and doesn't smell like old parchment.

Last Tuesday, I attempted to join a local book club. I spent forty minutes explaining the subtle influence of Neo-Platonism on the author's prose, only to be told that I was "bringing the vibe down."

I walked home in the rain, laughing. It was a genuine, belly-deep laugh. There is something profoundly liberating about being a god who cannot find his keys.

I sat on my fire escape, watching the yellow cabs swarm like angry bees below. I thought about the great libraries I had seen burn, the empires I had watched crumble. All that knowledge, all those centuries of study, and here I was, unable to buy a burger without the help of a sixteen-year-old.

The universe is not a tragedy, I realized. It is a sitcom. And I am the only one who knows the script, which makes the punchlines all the more exquisite.

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