Cleaning Jesus' Garage

Sunset Blvd.

I’m really conscious of time, more than ever; not hours in the day but simply days – day after day after day.  They accumulate so rapidly.  The arrival of 2013 is a fanfare moment, duly noted and now almost forgotten.  This year has taken on the character and rhythm of most every year preceding it.  The year’s number designation is of no matter in life.  We rely on ourselves to determine the nature of the time we use.  How do we address the moment?  The words ‘acceptance without passivity’ sound good to me.  I suppose that means being active in a focused, goal-oriented manner while being personally dispassionate.  One becomes absorbed in a process while being detached from consideration of personal penalty and reward.  Attaining this attitude would seem to result in increased freedom and clarity of thought.

What an oddly vacant crossroad this is.  Heaven waits beyond the horizon.  Once I arrive Jesus has me clean out his garage.  Mementos are everywhere.  I am initially undaunted but, over time, I discover the chore never ends.  An eternity of memories are revealed but only a few at a time.  Why me?  Why am I singled out for such a lonely task?  Because you must find here what you haven’t yet found, Jesus says.  What is it I’m supposed to find among all this dust, I ask.  You should know, Jesus responds.  I think I do but I won’t give him the satisfaction of acknowledging it. 

Instead I say, “Why not just toss me into Hell?”

“There is no Hell,” he says.  “There’s nothing to learn there.”

“And will I learn something here?”

“You already have.”

“But there’s more?”

“Yes.”

“What happens if I discover what I haven’t yet found?”

“You disappear.”

“This should make me happy?”

“You’re gone.  Happiness is irrelevant.”

“I don’t want to be gone.  I choose not to find it.”

“It doesn’t matter.  You have forever.  You will find it and you will lose yourself.”

“It’s rigged.  I can’t win.  I hate this whole rotten existence.”

“Yes.  Being ‘no more’ is beginning to look appealing, isn't it?”

“I hate you.”

“I’m used to it.”

Time is what you make it.  Not time is also infinite.  This is the fact of death.  Somewhere a birth day is celebrated, the beginning of a one time chance at life.  We are given the opportunity to discover our own personal meaning for living.  During this process we also search for the meaning of our own personal death.  Once the moment of death arrives everything of ourselves that hasn't yet been passed along for others to know is lost forever.  There is no second chance.  This is what I choose to think.  I won’t quietly take it with me.