December 31st 2009

    I am fairly certain those conditions that might qualify me for "Rapture" are absent.  So I think my second choice for World End Provider should include a decision making process that requires us to chose which things to take with us into Another World.   

    I picture a process of  embarkation where space aboard may be limited.  This is not an approaching flood to rid us of the unaligned, rather we are altogether bound for a new and unknown dimension.  Each of us with a suitcase.   And this circumstance of the suitcase is one I have faced on several occasions, so here I regard myself as one who is pre-formed by experience.

    Clear in my mind is a small rock that probably contained lead, which I carried in my suitcase when I said farewell to my friend Okanya.   Quite why I carried the rock with me, I have no clue, except perhaps it contained what in a simpler time I thought of as preciousness.   And indeed if I had that rock with me now it would still be precious, but in one or other of many transitions this rock most likely discovered alternate form.

    Then there was the time I found myself with an electric kettle that would not fit into my rucksack.  I wandered the streets of a town called Slough, which is in England, carrying this kettle.  The kettle itself had been thrust upon me so that I could "at least have a cup of tea."  Unfortunately the streets of Slough were not paved with electric outlets.

    As years gathered, I garnered experience and I can recall a number of times when suitcase packing contained less and less consideration of things that are in process of passing.   And I am inclined to consider this minimalist suitcase as template for those parts of stuff that I will carry into an unknown future.  But this would be an error, because there will be a moment of disembarkation.  Footsteps upon new soil.   Blank stares, tears for things gone, no Holiday Inn with the 'all you can eat free' buffet on the horizon to cheer us all up.  

    So what would I need?  Traditional thinking has always suggested that this moment of disembarkation requires something to justify a continued presence.   So while my suitcase containing a packet of Bic lighters and a dozen cartons of cigarettes could possibly summarize us all perfectly, I would do well to include flamboyant offerings that suggest commitment to purpose. 

    Certainly there will be no large winged or horned being to act as guide when we disembark, but woe betide those of us who overlook the inevitable suitcase inspection by others.   And here, I regret to say, I have already practiced raising a corner of the upper lip, because the last time I made this transition to another place these flamboyant offerings required the moving capacity of almost an entire tractor trailer.   

tim candler

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