A better place.

 

The Simple Raven’s Post.

A better place.

The air in the church was heavy with the smell of hundreds of people and incense. My ears rang from the silence. I could still hear the organ and the voices of the choir that a minute ago filled the space with energy. The community said goodbye to one of its own, giving it all they had. Now there were voices of people filtering through the opened double doors as the funeral staff was loading the elaborate shiny wood coffin onto the hearse and there was a harsh slam of a car door closing. Bang. One who lived here is now gone and not coming back. A living, breathing person used up all the minutes he had. In the cemetery, the people will gather around an open grave and some men in long white gowns will say words. There will be a sound of dirt and rocks falling on wood….

In the church lobby, one person remains sitting in a wheelchair. I go to talk. The elderly lady has red eyes and wrinkles. Hello, hi. Are you a relative I asked, pointing towards the doors. Yes, she said, no explanation. He is going to a better place; she said. Silence. He will meet his dad, she said in a quivering voice. Yes, I agreed and stayed close. Sometimes we just need another human around. I am it. I feel shame. Did I just lie to the old woman? She looks as if soon she will find out for herself. Her minutes of life are close to being used up. I hope she used hers well. Will she be up there looking down at me, saying, you lied to me? I wish I could not think that, but I can’t help it. Do I know that we go to a “better place?”

I look at her hands in her lap. They are old and wrinkled. The joints are swollen. She is wearing a long, good-quality black jacket. My mind whirls. I see the pudgy hands of a toddler jumping up and down without control. Now, the hands of a prepubescent girl adorned with a thin gold ring. The picture changes. There is a slender young woman’s hand by a lacey white sleeve, and a man is placing an expensive gold ring on it. It fits perfectly. The hands change again, holding a child.

Are we going to a better place? What would be a better place I ask myself? I am in a world perfect for humans and other animals. It provides all that we need. Air, water, food, shelter, continuity of crated species, free energy, work, entertainment, love. It’s all there and we just have to find it and take it. There is always enough for everybody. When we run out of food, soon we discover ways to make more. If we are short in one area, we have ways to bring it from another location where there is a surplus. It is a gift that keeps on giving.

Nothing ever stays the same in our world. It is constantly renewing itself, improving, and evolving. The Earth knows we are built for work and problem solving, so our lives are like a game. It is aware that we get bored with monotony, so it offers a myriad of options in every respect. Those who complain about the world tend to forget that all the evils of the world are man-made or could be prevented by humans taking the right decisions.

I am in a church trying to counsel an older woman full of grief. Again, cautiously, I look at the beautiful old face that witnessed so much in this life. She doesn’t show any sign of hope. Weak and probably ill with more than one disease, she sits there in her wheelchair wringing her old-looking hands that have seen better days. She couldn’t even go to the last part of the funeral of someone she dearly loved. Later, I discovered it was her son.

Two things she wants are to go to a better place and to see again those she loved who died. She feels that she lived too long. She reluctantly accepts what she was told but wishes that things would be different, but youth is not coming back and we thrive on youth.

Slowly and carefully, I kneel beside her, take her hand in mine, and say, there is another way.

I will not tell her that we have to change our ways to be in a better place. She is too old and fragile to cause a change and it will not happen in her lifetime.

We here in this church believe in everlasting life and a world without end, I say. Everyone says that, we sing it, but people don’t really believe what they can’t see. Yet we all believe in a Holy Spirit that no one has ever seen. I know it is true and now you do as well. All that has passed is still there. It didn’t go anywhere; we only chose to believe that it couldn’t be true, so for us, it’s not.

She was sleeping. Dream shamelessly little one.

Here is a link to my blog: https://thesimpleravenspost.blogspot.ca/  Feel free to check other articles and comment.

The air in the church was heavy with the smell of hundreds of people and incense. My ears rang from the silence. I could still hear the organ and the voices of the choir that a minute ago filled the space with energy. The community said goodbye to one of its own, giving it all they had. Now there were voices of people filtering through the opened double doors as the funeral staff was loading the elaborate shiny wood coffin onto the hearse and there was a harsh slam of a car door closing. Bang. One who lived here is now gone and not coming back. A living, breathing person used up all the minutes he had. In the cemetery, the people will gather around an open grave and some men in long white gowns will say words. There will be a sound of dirt and rocks falling on wood….

In the church lobby, one person remains sitting in a wheelchair. I go to talk. The elderly lady has red eyes and wrinkles. Hello, hi. Are you a relative I asked, pointing towards the doors. Yes, she said, no explanation. He is going to a better place; she said. Silence. He will meet his dad, she said in a quivering voice. Yes, I agreed and stayed close. Sometimes we just need another human around. I am it. I feel shame. Did I just lie to the old woman? She looks as if soon she will find out for herself. Her minutes of life are close to being used up. I hope she used hers well. Will she be up there looking down at me, saying, you lied to me? I wish I could not think that, but I can’t help it. Do I know that we go to a “better place?”

I look at her hands in her lap. They are old and wrinkled. The joints are swollen. She is wearing a long, good-quality black jacket. My mind whirls. I see the pudgy hands of a toddler jumping up and down without control. Now, the hands of a prepubescent girl adorned with a thin gold ring. The picture changes. There is a slender young woman’s hand by a lacey white sleeve, and a man is placing an expensive gold ring on it. It fits perfectly. The hands change again, holding a child.

Are we going to a better place? What would be a better place I ask myself? I am in a world perfect for humans and other animals. It provides all that we need. Air, water, food, shelter, continuity of crated species, free energy, work, entertainment, love. It’s all there and we just have to find it and take it. There is always enough for everybody. When we run out of food, soon we discover ways to make more. If we are short in one area, we have ways to bring it from another location where there is a surplus. It is a gift that keeps on giving.

Nothing ever stays the same in our world. It is constantly renewing itself, improving, and evolving. The Earth knows we are built for work and problem solving, so our lives are like a game. It is aware that we get bored with monotony, so it offers a myriad of options in every respect. Those who complain about the world tend to forget that all the evils of the world are man-made or could be prevented by humans taking the right decisions.

I am in a church trying to counsel an older woman full of grief. Again, cautiously, I look at the beautiful old face that witnessed so much in this life. She doesn’t show any sign of hope. Weak and probably ill with more than one disease, she sits there in her wheelchair wringing her old-looking hands that have seen better days. She couldn’t even go to the last part of the funeral of someone she dearly loved. Later, I discovered it was her son.

Two things she wants are to go to a better place and to see again those she loved who died. She feels that she lived too long. She reluctantly accepts what she was told but wishes that things would be different, but youth is not coming back and we thrive on youth.

Slowly and carefully, I kneel beside her, take her hand in mine, and say, there is another way.

I will not tell her that we have to change our ways to be in a better place. She is too old and fragile to cause a change and it will not happen in her lifetime.

We here in this church believe in everlasting life and a world without end, I say. Everyone says that, we sing it, but people don’t really believe what they can’t see. Yet we all believe in a Holy Spirit that no one has ever seen. I know it is true and now you do as well. All that has passed is still there. It didn’t go anywhere; we only chose to believe that it couldn’t be true, so for us, it’s not.

She was sleeping. Dream shamelessly little one.

Here is a link to my blog: https://thesimpleravenspost.blogspot.ca/  Feel free to check other articles and comment.