They burst into my room on stars, trailing unseen comets, the three-person team from Eternity Network News. Moments earlier I was simply conversing with the great Unknown, explaining why I knew death wasn’t near. Our conversation had been delightful and I think I impressed the Unknown. But then these yahoos showed up.
The interviewer sported the latest iPhone 9G, the camera dude recorded it in strict holographic 4-D but the sound technician was the weirdest; she just used an old microphone from Vaudeville days. They were aggressive, rude and wanted the story. They had deadlines to meet in many different dimensions and even though this happened years or moments ago, they just now sent me the transcripts. I think I did pretty well for being pushed into the spotlight.
ENN: So thanks for joining us. Are you afraid to die?
Rodney: Wow, uh, whatever happened to opening with the easier questions; “What’s your favorite color? What’re the top songs on your iPod?”
ENN: Do you want to answer those questions?
Rodney: Well, I would’ve at least like to give a shout out to The Police, U2 or Vampire Weekend.
ENN: You just did. Are you afraid to die?
Rodney: No, actually I’m not. That doesn’t mean I’m ready for it to happen any time soon. As a matter of fact, I …
ENN: That’s just a smokescreen, camouflage. When people say they aren’t afraid to die — they just don’t want to yet — it usually means they’re very scared.
Rodney: I can’t speak for others, even though I try to on my blog sometimes. I can just be as honest with myself as I know how to be and say no, I don’t fear death.
ENN: Okay, we’ll pretend you aren’t lying. Why aren’t you afraid to die?
Rodney: Oh thank you so much for granting me leniency. I don’t fear death because I feel deep within me that I was on another plane of existence before I joined this three dimensional, earth-based one and that my soul will travel back to either that place before or a new place afterward.
ENN: You feel it? Do you have anything to back it up?
Rodney: Why yes I do, but you’re not going to like it.
ENN: Why is that?
Rodney: Because it’s based on a mixture of science and faith and flowers. Are you ready?
ENN: Oh do tell.
Rodney: Well, let’s look at science for starters. The first law, the very First Law of Thermodynamics is what?
ENN: Energy can be changed but it can’t be created or destroyed. Hey wait, we’re the ones asking the questions. Why do you bring up the First Law?
Rodney: It’s self explanatory really. If some of the greatest scientific minds in the world hold this as their first law, who am I to blow against the wind?
ENN: Meaning?
Rodney: Meaning when you boil down our essence as humans, we are really just vast interconnections of love, thought, experience and learning. All those things are energy. How is it possible for that to vanish simply because we’re closing our eyes for the final time on earth?
ENN: That sounds like mental gymnastics. What else do you have?
Rodney: Boy, you’re tough. It really isn’t gymnastics. When I think or when I dream or when I love, there are actual brainwaves that can be measured. You’ve seen the children’s game at Toys R Us, haven’t you. It allows you to manipulate a Star Wars object up and down just by thinking about it? If you can buy something for $99.95, (batteries sold separately), that operates simply by brain activity, then mental gymnastics will only make me more hardy and fit.
ENN: Okay, you got me there. So we’re energy…
Rodney: … yes and faith too. But my faith is based on many things I’ve seen over the years and expect to keep seeing.
ENN: Such as?
Rodney: Well, coincidences which aren’t just incidents randomly happening at the same time. Then there are the deep emotional feelings suddenly springing out of the holy spots I’ve experienced in the world. The feeling of my father’s soul whooshing away as I held his dead body. The whole streetlights talking to us thing. And lots more.
ENN: You realize that last paragraph was horrifically vague and rife with grammatical mistakes.
Rodney: Wow, if that’s all you can respond with, I must be onto something. How about this; since the dawn of recorded history there have always been deities among the lore and culture of societies. Sure, that shows there are always attempts to explain things with something other than pure cause and effect. But I have to believe there’s something to the force that compels primitive societies, all the way up to today, to believe in something more out there.
ENN: Vague as can be.
Rodney: And yet you’re interviewing me from something called Eternity Network News.
ENN: Shush.
Rodney: “Shush,” how cosmic.
ENN: So you have a freakish admixture of faith and science going for you. Nice. What were you saying about flowers?
Rodney: I thought you’d forgotten. Flowers are just one of the many proofs for me that an overarching deity or a divine force exists in the universe.
ENN: Deity? Divine Force? Are you afraid to use the word God?
Rodney: Not at all. I just can’t define what God means to me or to others. But there’s no real explanation for flowers to be here or for them to be so brilliantly beautiful. Sure, you could say they evolved that way and they probably did. You could say they attract bees and the pollination process insures their existence but many other plants need pollen and aren’t nearly as pretty.
ENN: That’s pretty shaky.
Rodney: Take it further. Why do we need lovely blossoms on this planet? Why do we need the bees that punch their time clocks at the flower factories? Why do we need the honey the bees make? Why do we need the bears that find that honey while out on a stroll with Christopher Robin? Why do we need anything other than strict functionality on earth? Keep going. Why do we need earth?
ENN: You’re getting out of control.
Rodney: No, it’s simple. We don’t need any of this when you take a strict, staunch scientific approach. None of this matters. The Universe happened randomly; the earth happened randomly; Cappuccino Blasts happened randomly. But I just can’t believe deep in my soul that love, friendship, family, connections, kissing, great movies, emotions and pizza are just random occurrences that happened only because of the Big Bang.
ENN: Oh, so you believe in the Big Bang Theory? Do you believe in evolution too?
Rodney: Of course but stay with me. Those two things, evolution and The Big Bang, explain what happened mechanically. I’m talking about what happened along with them as the systems progressed and what has happened in other galaxies and other planes of existence and …
ENN: Whoa Rodney, hold on. You’re just spouting off random spittle with no coherent thread.
Rodney: And you’re about the worst interviewer I’ve ever met.
ENN: This story isn’t going to lead tonight’s newscast. I’d be surprised if it gets any play at all. So how do you want to end it?
Rodney: Many years from now, frankly. And as a matter of fact, my doctor says all signs point to me living a long and healthy life.
ENN: This is definitely not getting any airtime. Anything else?
Rodney: Yeah, there is. Who are you really?
And with that, my three visitors ceremoniously removed their masks. We all burst out laughing and they speed skated off this dimension to their live satellite truck on a shower of electrons and left me wondering where to send my resume in 40 or 50 years.