here is another thing, something which is much more readable than if i was to tell you about my day for a bit. it was called, "the problem with heaven", though i am renaming it, to "another thing". i've put it in big words, to make the page look a bit different.
I did not expect to be talking, as I find myself now, to the Angel Gabriel.
Mainly because I was sitting in a coffee shop, whilst on holiday to Florence, waiting for a friend. They said they'd be a few minutes, because they were looking at tops in some clothes shop, somewhere.
Anyway, Gabriel was in the queue, and he appeared, as angels are meant to be, friendly. He got a coffee, and sat at the table next to me. He sat with his legs crossed, knee over knee, the way intelligent people do when he is about to explain his opinion.
He got into conversation, quite quickly, about all the problems with heaven.
“Heaven” said he, “is like a holiday. You are on holiday, am I right? ...Yes, I guessed so. Then you can agree, surely, that it is on a holiday where you do not really care about anything. On holidays you make big plans for what you will do when you get back. You might decide to join up to a club or a gym, to improve yourself, to be nicer, or, perhaps meaner to people, to go out more, or to stay in more. You might decide, in a moment of freedom from everything else, to spill your heart and soul out to someone special, because, you say to yourself, it doesn't really matter what will happen because of it. As the clerics and the priests have said, Heaven is “Eternal Bliss”, though they are both right and wrong about that. It is a bliss, but not for the reasons that they think it is. It is a bliss because ignorance, as the wise always say, is bliss. And the biggest ignorance is of consequences, and that is the eternal bliss.
“The problem with heaven, you see, is that it is Touristy. Really tacky. You can't go wandering a few feet without bumping into a souvenir stand or some angel shouting about some offer on at a reastaurant, or pushing a sale onto some new and recently deceased tourist who hasn't fully gotten used to heaven yet. Everyone has cameras, but no one to show the pictures too. It's like a capital city; big, expensive, rude, uncaring. Beautiful, but in the end, dull.
“The worse thing, is that you can never go home and join the gyms, the clubs, or the new social elites. You can never be nicer or meaner to anyone, and you can never go out more, or stay in more. You will never get the chance to talk to that special someone about all those things you've wanted to say but only now, after feeling on top of the world, have plucked up the gumption to do so.
“There is a reason for this. It's not because god likes to play games with you, or lie or trick, it is because life is infinitely better than death. Heaven reminds you that you had it made back in the days when you could breathe, or speak, or feel. You could do whatever you wanted, and watch your dreams become realities. Heaven is not somewhere you would really want to be, because to want to be in heaven is a want to be dead. And that is not how all the living things were designed, millions of years ago.
"We were all designed to have lots of smashing fun, all the time. We were given the free will, because we would only have the on chance to use it. The inevitable end, the nothing at the end of the trip, is supposed to be ignored and forgotten, because you aren't paying attention to it. Ignorance, as the wise man has already said, is bliss. But not too much bliss. The best thing about life is that you have the option to decide what to do, you have hopes, and dreams, and it is only in life that you can do something about them.”
We continued talking. Apparently, he comes to Florence everyday for coffee. He has a love for the city, it's history, and its life, he says. After he had finished his rant about life and death, I offered to buy him another coffee, which he politely accepted. He picked up a crinkled, rolled up copy of the newspaper as I left the table.
Mainly because I was sitting in a coffee shop, whilst on holiday to Florence, waiting for a friend. They said they'd be a few minutes, because they were looking at tops in some clothes shop, somewhere.
Anyway, Gabriel was in the queue, and he appeared, as angels are meant to be, friendly. He got a coffee, and sat at the table next to me. He sat with his legs crossed, knee over knee, the way intelligent people do when he is about to explain his opinion.
He got into conversation, quite quickly, about all the problems with heaven.
“Heaven” said he, “is like a holiday. You are on holiday, am I right? ...Yes, I guessed so. Then you can agree, surely, that it is on a holiday where you do not really care about anything. On holidays you make big plans for what you will do when you get back. You might decide to join up to a club or a gym, to improve yourself, to be nicer, or, perhaps meaner to people, to go out more, or to stay in more. You might decide, in a moment of freedom from everything else, to spill your heart and soul out to someone special, because, you say to yourself, it doesn't really matter what will happen because of it. As the clerics and the priests have said, Heaven is “Eternal Bliss”, though they are both right and wrong about that. It is a bliss, but not for the reasons that they think it is. It is a bliss because ignorance, as the wise always say, is bliss. And the biggest ignorance is of consequences, and that is the eternal bliss.
“The problem with heaven, you see, is that it is Touristy. Really tacky. You can't go wandering a few feet without bumping into a souvenir stand or some angel shouting about some offer on at a reastaurant, or pushing a sale onto some new and recently deceased tourist who hasn't fully gotten used to heaven yet. Everyone has cameras, but no one to show the pictures too. It's like a capital city; big, expensive, rude, uncaring. Beautiful, but in the end, dull.
“The worse thing, is that you can never go home and join the gyms, the clubs, or the new social elites. You can never be nicer or meaner to anyone, and you can never go out more, or stay in more. You will never get the chance to talk to that special someone about all those things you've wanted to say but only now, after feeling on top of the world, have plucked up the gumption to do so.
“There is a reason for this. It's not because god likes to play games with you, or lie or trick, it is because life is infinitely better than death. Heaven reminds you that you had it made back in the days when you could breathe, or speak, or feel. You could do whatever you wanted, and watch your dreams become realities. Heaven is not somewhere you would really want to be, because to want to be in heaven is a want to be dead. And that is not how all the living things were designed, millions of years ago.
"We were all designed to have lots of smashing fun, all the time. We were given the free will, because we would only have the on chance to use it. The inevitable end, the nothing at the end of the trip, is supposed to be ignored and forgotten, because you aren't paying attention to it. Ignorance, as the wise man has already said, is bliss. But not too much bliss. The best thing about life is that you have the option to decide what to do, you have hopes, and dreams, and it is only in life that you can do something about them.”
We continued talking. Apparently, he comes to Florence everyday for coffee. He has a love for the city, it's history, and its life, he says. After he had finished his rant about life and death, I offered to buy him another coffee, which he politely accepted. He picked up a crinkled, rolled up copy of the newspaper as I left the table.
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