Cosmic unconsciousness

Well, it just burns every cell in my atheist/materialist body to say this, but I have to admit that I think I am being a little bit psychic right now.



Each month I get the latest issue of the Buffy comic book overnighted to my house. It’s wrapped in plastic and backed by a special non-acid board to keep it from bending and getting damaged. This is Season 8, picking up right where the series ended. Last month Buffy got the power of flight. She was all flying around all over the place and the cover was so cool. Buffy looked like Superman…but like Buffy too. It was as if Buffy and Superman were kind of the same person. As I was reading it I thought, golly, they have not had Angel in this comic at all. I wonder what happened to Angel and all his crazy friends back in Los Angles after that show went off the air?


My new issue just showed up. Guess who is on the cover?


Guess.
 

No guess.

Guess.


No really. Guess.


Guess.


Angel?


Yes! Angel!


Then last week I was thinking about Rosanne Cash and how much I missed her putting out an album of her own stuff -- one independent of the emotional drama of her father’s death. I know you can’t really put out an album of your own work and have it not reflect that emotional drama of your father’s death, but I was thinking back to a really good interview she did on All Things Considered when Rules of Travel came out years ago. It was before June died, and Johnny died, and before Rosanne had brain surgery. Talk about drama..


Anyway, the next day I see on the SeattlePI.com that Rosanne Cash is going to be at the Paramount Theatre on May 1st and it will be hosted by Michelle Norris of All Things Considered. I made Mark buy tickets for my birthday. See how psychic I am being right now?


Yesterday I was thinking about my friend Linda who died recently. Then last night her husband called.


Buffy is all about the supernatural and stuff so that does not seem so weird. Plus she died, twice. And the psychic power with Rosanne Cash at least fits. She’s all about how knowledge transcends time and space, life and death.


But Linda? Tiny little Jewish Linda? I don’t think so. Wow, could this be some kind of ghost thing?


I am so stuck on how to grieve here. I have never had a friend die before. The funeral several weeks ago was just for the family.


In the shower yesterday morning I decided I should go drive by her house and then have breakfast and Endolyne Joe’s, where we usually met for breakfast on Sunday mornings. It didn’t end up happening but I came very close. Those were nice, the breakfasts. I’d whine about work, she’d whine about chemo, I’d talk about my next trip to Italy or France or Hawaii and push her to get on a plane to anywhere. She always would swear like a trucker. “He was such a god damn fucking asshole!” As a restaurant manger you can’t really yell at a tiny little woman who has no hair and is obviously on chemo.


Last time I saw her she was just so tired of being sick. She cried. I cried. A good time was not had by all. I got busy at work with my new job and didn’t sync up with her before I went to Paris. I sent email on Christmas day from France and did not hear back. I joked that maybe it was a Jewish thing but I knew something was up. A few weeks later that supposedly blond woman that I used to work for at the Mermaid emailed me to say Linda had died.


I don’t know what happened. Last I heard her numbers were OK so I think maybe she just got sick of chemo, but I do not know that. No way was I going to call her husband or son to ask. I don’t know who to talk to about this.


Her Facebook page is still up. I know people have discovered she died by going there. This is so weird and creepy and wonderful all at the same time. Last night when her husband called the caller ID showed her name. When I called back today I heard her voice on the answering machine still. I hope it stays there for a long time.


Greg called me because they want to do a remembrance / celebration ceremony for her friends in April . He needed my address for the invitation.


Seeing her on caller ID, and Facebook, and hearing her on voice mail just exacerbates this feeling that nothing has changed, that she is still out there and we’ll meet up next Sunday over coffee. This does not help with the grieving. I know I need to deal with that, and that going to the ceremony to celebrate her life would help, but it just fills me with dread. I would do anything for her husband or son, but I don’t know if I can deal with seeing all the people from the Mermaid who will be there. Yes, I know I am taking someone’s death and making it all about me, but this is my blog, so bite me. I don’t know if I can do it. If I don’t I may continue to have these psychic events I fear. Maybe I will luck out and be in Singapore and be unable to attend, thus avoiding this whole moral crisis.


Ugh! So anyway, back to the whole psychic thing. For a couple of weeks now I keep thinking of things and then they show up. It’s just like in Repo Man:


A lot o' people don't realize what's really going on. They view life as a bunch o' unconnected incidents 'n things. They don't realize that there's this, like, lattice o' coincidence that lays on top o' everything. Give you an example, show you what I mean: suppose you're thinkin' about a plate o' shrimp. Suddenly someone'll say, like, "plate," or "shrimp," or "plate o' shrimp" out of the blue, no explanation. No point in lookin' for one, either. It's all part of a cosmic unconsciousness.


That is it. I have tapped into my cosmic unconsciousness. Today I was listening to Morning Edition and I heard that Steve Inskeep is in Afghanistan for a few weeks. It occurred to me that perhaps he will get blown up. I think there is a difference between having a psychic premonition and just wishing for something to happen.


Right now I am seeing an image of me buying lottery tickets. I wonder if I will actually buy lottery tickets this week.


Linda, if I am wrong about everything and there is in fact an afterlife, could you please send me a message? A sign? What lottery numbers will be drawn this coming Wednesday evening? Just a small little indication like this is all I need to believe.






More later…..




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