Nevermore

When I was at writing school, I wrote a short story called Sicker and Sicker, a largely satirical piece that described one day in the life of a married couple in contrast to the entire timeline of the earth. The theory was that if the planet earth had been surviving for 13.77 billion years, and this was contrasted in "24 hours" (as a timeline), the human race only entered the picture in the last “two minutes”.  Therefore humans haven't been around all that long really. Of course, the story was written as a piece of fiction so there are no historical accuracies, but I do remember writing one anecdote in the story that came from one of my own personal theories. Now, bear in mind that was a lot younger, a lot less knowledgeable, and most of all, had no reasonable understanding of science that could make a claim to a reasonable scientific theory.

My theory was simple. The dinosaurs were a result of a nuclear war. Yup. You see, the world had been around twice as long as many had thought. Civilisation was wiped out by a nuclear war; destroying everything and leaving the planet inhabit less. As a result, strange creatures began to emerge from what was left of the slime. This is why when you see pictures of prehistoric activity, the sky is always a pale red – that’s the result of nuclear fallout. The dinosaurs survived for a period of time before they were wiped out by an asteroid or meteor, and humans began to evolve (once again).

The humans survived for another period of time. Then they invented the nuclear bomb (again). And yes, as per cycle, the human race once again destroyed themselves and the dinosaurs again emerged from the mess.

Now, I never thought this theory was without flaw. But I thought it was a reasonable theory fit for a satirical piece of fiction, and for what it’s worth, the short story received a High Distinction and much applause from my peers (one of my happiest moments).

My point to this blog entry isn’t to talk about a short story from 1995.

I find that the older I get the more I think about the why, what, when and how’s of the universe, like I guess most people do. Or perhaps they don’t, I don’t know. If they do, they probably don’t talk about it, just leaving it to keep them awake at night, or by spending most of their energy on a daily basis trying to ignore it. I always knew that death was an inevitability, but like most people, you don’t really stop to think about it. When you’re younger it doesn’t bother you much, because you know you have your whole life ahead of you. When you get to 40 you realise you’re at the middle part of your existence (assuming you don’t get a serious illness or die tragically before your time).

While most people fall back on their religion, some people don’t have one to fall back on. I had always hoped that religion would find me. I never wanted to force it, or look for it. I saw the Deli Lama do a talk once when he came to Melbourne many years ago. I liked a lot of what he said and for awhile I thought I might be a Buddhist. I have always said that every creature has a right to life. I no longer kill spiders or flies (my wife doesn’t rest until the spider is caught, killed, and the body is identified), preferring to put them outside. After all, they couldn’t help being born a spider or a fly, could they? Just like I couldn’t help being born a human.

And just like any other creature on this earth, why would we not be annihilated when we die just like insects and animals? I could never fathom why someone would believe there is a heaven and a hell, a concept that would have both heaven and hell packed to the brim with centuries of people of both good and evil temperament. Why are humans so special (egocentric) to believe that we are the only species to have the privilege of some sort of after life?

The concept of nihilism scares me beyond belief. The only positive I can find about it is that I will have no memories, nothing at all to take with me – hence the name “nihilism”. When you’re dead you’re dead. There’s nothing after life like there’s nothing before life.

I have no memories of before I was born – I simply didn’t exist. And that’s death as far as I’m concerned.

Question: Are there dinosaurs in heaven?