Wild speculation

On polar bears:

God: Tracy, could you come over here for a moment?
God's P.A. Tracy: Yes, sir. What is it?
God: What's the cutest animal we have designed?
Tracy: I think that would be the white bear with the black nose.
God: Right. We need to move it far away from the humans.
Tracy: Why?
God: Because they will be too distracted by its cuteness.
Tracy: (writing in her pad) OK, white bears to ice caps. What about puppies should we move those too?
God: No. That's different.

Real letters from real geeks

Dear purveyors of electronic music,

I've had just about enough of your squeaks and squeals, your grinding bass, your thumping and testicle shattering bass, all of it. Give it a goddamn rest. I know, I know, you're really clever with that laptop of yours and you look badass in a pair of headphones, but I don't give a rusty fuck. I'm trying to get some reading done here.

There is a time and place for that kind of "music"; namely cavernous warehouses or hangars on the outskirts of town. So baffling is the experience of this artform, drug use is basically mandatory. Who could listen to dubstep sober? Why would you?

But now I endure this cacophony even as I sit down to the Sunday New York Times crossword puzzle (I do that shit with pen, fuckers) in the comfort of my own home. It so happens that my neighbours are people with devastatingly, heart-achingly, terrible taste in music. I shall carbon copy them on this note, and remit a third carbon copy to God (In the remote hope that he empathizes and makes all your heads explode in a messy fell swoop. He might recall that he owes me).

Signed an old fogey,


Harvey

Religion reform #23

By respect for life we become religious in a way that is elementary, profound and alive. -Albert Schweitzer

I must confess that once, for the briefest-flicker-of-a-moment-that-was-over-before-I-knew it, I felt it. And by it, I mean the staggering presence of a creator. You heard me. The G-man. I felt it and I believed. Really.

And I should explain that I was neither high nor intoxicated when I had this feeling. I wasn't melancholy, suicidal or bristling with Baptist levels of glee. I was simply doddering around the parking garage underneath my apartment, and pondering the myriad of conveniences that pervaded my life:

• my sweet apartment
• the storage locker under my apartment that is super cheap
• the fact that we have two Zipcars in our parking garage
• the dope coffee beans I had just purchased from T.A.N.
• that I had all my limbs and mental faculties

And then I looked down at an oil slick in the filthy and poorly-ventilated space and realized how nothing was in my control. That if life was an enormous and undulating flag, gripped on all sides by a million frenetic arms, I could contribute little more than a pair of thumbs and forefingers clinging desperately to the waving sheet. And I'd watch my arms lift and fall, but feel nothing but the flag pinched between my fingertips.

The feeling evaporated in moments, but heck, I'd feel it again. The pins and needles of irrational belief is kind of intoxicating.

(It is worth mentioning that the garage is poorly-ventilated, so I might have been getting high on CO fumes.)

Wild Speculation

On the Higgs boson:

Tracy: Sir, I need you for a minute.
God: I'm sorry did you say something?
Tracy: (sigh) This is important, sir. Can you tear yourself away from that football game for just a second?
God: But they need me! It's regional championships.
Tracy: Sir. This is important.
God: (Slaps his Macbook shut.) Fine. What is it now? Sloths too slow?
Tracy: The humans are asking serious questions about matter. Particles. They want to know what gives them mass.
God: That's it? Just burn the answer into a taco or something.
Tracy: But we don't know sir.
God: Shouldn't we have figured this out already? Just look in the Big Bang Binder.
Tracy: (curtly) Well, the day we were supposed to have figured it out it was the NCAA finals.
God:
Tracy:
God: Fine, just develop a new force.
Tracy: That won't work. They have a model.
God: OK... then make it a field that interacts with particles to give them mass.
Tracy: A field? Made up of what?
God: I dunno, more particles?
Tracy: Whatever you say, sir.
God: And make these actually hard to discover for My sake. I've gotta get back to this game.

Now I'm hungry for a hot tranny

Let's talk longings primitive instinct
Elements meet forever they're linked
Life's just endless rethink, looks like
Your march rages onward hoodwinked

Fiery spirits serious ghostings
Energy surge and violent smoke rings
And I'm wont to choke things looks like
Pious hearts shall outbeat most things

You are a most animal being
Equally breathing, doing, seeing
Glimpse of Toucan fleeing looks like
Cosmos dance existence freeing

Now I'm hungry for a hot tranny
Ready to go; can't break a twenty
She can shake a fanny looks like
I chalked up a few too many

I've done worse than cover up numbers
Nonetheless I'm cool as cucumbers
Life is strength in numbers looks like
Endings loom for golden slumbers

Religion reform #20

Around The Beginning a kind of, sort of, fucked up thing happened. It's described well in the Book of the Toucan, chapter 11:

11 And after the great Toucan squawked, and obliterated the void a small and almost imperceptible crystal —the size of 1,000,000 suns —landed on the tip of the Toucan's beak. It was a clock.

12 The perfect crystalline structure was a machine operating by precise laws. Though it appeared to be a pure crystal, inside was a magnificent lattice of light and energy humming away, in service of an idea greater than itself.

And later,

²³ When the Toucan leaned his mighty beak over the nascent universe and sneezed, at once the marvel of crystal clockwork was shattered as the infinite power of the Toucan's sneeze hurled an infinity of clock pieces in every direction.

Scholars have debated the meaning of this tale. Is the crystal a metaphor for mankind's fruitless quest for knowledge or is this just a cautionary tale about making sure to have taken anti-histamines? And just what is the point of a clock in a timeless pre-existence void?

Wild Speculation

On the invention of gravity:

God: I'm sick of all this matter flying apart.
Tracy: Maybe you could tweak the first law of motion?
God: Say what?
Tracy: Corpus omne perseverare in statu suo quiescendi vel movendi uniformiter in directum, nisi quatenus a viribus impressis cogitur statum illum mutare?
God: Yeah, I know. I wrote that.
Tracy: Yes, but what I mean is, do objects need to move apart ceaselessly? Maybe you could make it so things slow down after a while.
God: No. I like when things move fast.
Tracy: Right, but sir, that means these atoms are just going to spread apart across the universe.
God: So?
Tracy: Sir, you were just complaining about--
God: Right, right. So what do we do? I like when things go fast.
Tracy: Yes, sir.
God: What if we made it is so everything comes together fast too?
Tracy: That sounds kind of counterproductive, I mean--
God: Let's make it happen.
Tracy: So we're adding another force that contradicts inertia?
God: Actually, if you could make it the resultant effect of the curvature of spacetime caused by a massive body, that would be super.
Tracy: (sigh)

Underground

Being underground makes one's brain think in ways it otherwise might not, given that aboveground one has access to the Internet, and TV, and endless distractions and a globe of information. When one is not in that process of receiving information it feels strange; like the tap turned on a filling tub, the sudden quiet is unsettling. The water immediately starts to feel tepid and you long for the rush of the flow once again.

Many books about writing share similar advice about inspiration. "Draw from experience" is a common refrain. "Write what you know." It's equivalent to saying: "Be interesting. Have and absorb experiences worth repeating or reconstituting into a salable narrative."

That statement feels particularly acute in the cold disconnected underground. Shielded even from the radiation of the sun, it feels impossible to write what you know down here. Underground all a writer has are the few artifacts around him. I can only scrape at the grime-covered tile walls, or rub my sole gently against the unyielding terrazzo. Unconnected from everything that is not here, it's feels as though the world might fade to non-existence up those stairs. I lean over the platform and gaze into the darkness of the subway tunnel. Is there anything beyond it?

The layers of rock and dirt looming above me block a billion buzzing signals, responsible for frying my childhood sense of solipsism. How can one believe he's alone when he is endlessly bombarded with novel images, and voices, and ideas, and noise. The world above is too loud. But in the dark underground, in wait for a subway train I can for a moment believe that there is nothing but darkness filling the tunnels around me. And that dimly-lit walls and floor and rail and grime is all mine. The what I know.

Religion reform #19

I think for religion to survive in the modern world, it really needs to take a hard look at the concept of miracles. It's pretty clear that miracles do not happen. What does happen is events of this form:

• Man Miraculously Recovers from Severe Stroke
• Woman's Life Saved in Life Threatening Car Accident
• Sick Woman's Cancer Disappears Without A Trace

That is to say, a shitty event turns out to be less shitty than at first we thought. This is the stuff of miracles? It suggests to me that God — as the causer of the shitty event — is either indecisive or incompetent. Was he really trying to wreck that dude with a severe stroke? Then get 'er done, you homo. Was that car accident meant to be life-threatening? Did God change his mind at the last minute? Does he really have to resort to property destruction? Why give someone cancer just to take it away? That's the very definition of a Dick Move.

Of course, I don't expect an answer to these queries. What I want is beefier miracles. Some David Copperfield level shit. Jesus was popular because he raised from the dead, transmogrified water into booze, and defeated surface tension. That kind of jazz sells tickets. Modern miracles are so hackneyed and commonplace they're barely Interesting Happenstances let alone miracles. (If you have ever uttered the phrase "the miracle of childbirth" you deserve to perish in a housefire. Shame on you.)

I guess what I'm saying to the major religions is: call up David Blaine and get some shit going. Now. You can only reach Criss Angel? Whatever, it's better than nothing.

Religion reform #18

I would like to see, just once, someone assert the existence of God by making the following claims:

1. There exists something called Oreo ice cream.
2. Only God could have created as fulfilling and awe-inducing as Oreo ice cream.
3. Here, have a spoonful.  Seriously, I have lots.
4. Mm, how is it?  Good, right?  Let me try it.
5. (Mouth full of ice cream.) Mmmm, tell me God didn't make this. Oh, sweet Jesus.
6. I'll get you some more.
7. Therefore, God exists in realty.

Q.E.D. bitches. And then if anyone starts to get all fact-y or whatever, you take could away his ice cream or make a wicked milkshake and not let him have any.

Catho-lick my ass or: the heavenly lemur

Weddings are easily my least favorite function.  For starters, a wedding reception is a criminally tacky parade that's one-thousand times worse than prom.  And that's the part I look forward to.

The ceremony was in a Catholic church: the creepiest edifice I know about. I literally shudder every time I enter one and I shouldn't be able to feel the grip of Catholic guilt.  As I walked in, a smiling usher offered me a programme, but I refused it for fear that my heathen fingers would singe the paper. I managed to catch a glance at its contents though. There seemed to be approximately eighty-thousand readings and hymns on the docket, but I couldn't be sure.

I spent the entire ceremony swearing abominations against God in my head while looking at the ceiling.  I assume that's where God sits, nestled in the apse like a heavenly lemur. Occasionally, I pulled out my notebook to document the insanity.  Some notes:

If God is a slap chop, then religion is an infomercial.
Why force a celibate man to dress like a twat? Isn't his life hard enough?
Sacrament cup must be lousy with oral herpes. Also: I should come here to pre-game.
I need to object at a wedding -- just once.
I can't believe the bride and groom are missing this shit. Where are those assholes?
I wonder how many boys this guy has raped. He's got a bit of swagger. I'll say three.
I need to start a holy war -- just once.
If God just walked in would he take over the sermon or sit in the back?
This would be much better as a death metal rock opera.

It went on and fucking on.  We eventually hacked through the religious preamble and the bride and groom finally made their way down the aisle.  I wanted to lean over and kick one of them in the shins as if to say, "thanks a bunch," but I decided against it.  Or wasn't close enough.  Or something.

This overly religious service surprised me because I didn't think my friends were very religious.  Would I have to find new friends?  Could I have been mistaken?  Was Harvey Kornbluth wrong?

Of course not.  In the lone enjoyable moment of the entire ceremony the groom answered a long, bored, sarcastic "YES" -- the kind you offer your mother when she's asked you for the umpteenth time if you're going to make it for dinner on Saturday and you have already told her you are -- when asked if he would "accept children from God lovingly and bring them up according to the law of Christ and his Church."

Take that, Yeshua.  God: I hate weddings.

Wild speculation

On the great flood:

Man: Hey, God!  Can you hear me, loser?
Tracy: Just ignore him, sir.
Man: Hey, God!  You suck balls.  You hear me?
Tracy: I'll handle this, Tracy.
Tracy: Yes sir.  It's just that sometimes you tend to overreact and—
Man: Hey God, you're a faggot!
God: That does it.  Tracy, get hydro on the line.

Wild speculation

On the creation of the zebra:

God: Hey, bring that horse over here.  It needs some tweaking.
God's P.A. Tracy:  Sir, that animal was completed months ago.  It's been mass-produced already.  It's ready to be ship.
God: Just bring it here.
Tracy:  Sighs.  OK, here.  Just try not to change -- Oh, wow.  I'm not sure I would call that a 'tweak'...
God: Nice, eh?
Tracy:  This is going to take forever.

Religion reform #13

It would help if the Christian God wasn't such a flaming homosexual. Don't believe me? Read Genesis.

So God creates this enormous universe (it takes him forever too, like, six whole days) and when he's done he only puts one dude in it. One single man. And also he makes him a pretty little garden. (Genesis 2:8)

Doesn't this sound like a scenario a gay guy in love would describe to his boyfriend?

"Luke, I am so in love with you. If I was God, I would create a whole world for us and it would be perfect and it would only be you and me."

That's exactly what God did! He created a universe for a single man. Named Adam. And I don't know if you know this, but that is on the Official List of Gay Names. (Numbers 3:2) (c.f. Masters of the Universe.) You're probably thinking, "but I have a friend named Adam, and he's not gay."

Fact: he's gay, even if he isn't. Trust me.

But anyway, God should really tone it down. Just saying.

Wild speculation

On the origin of blue whales:

God: Fuck, we have a lot of blubber left over.
God's personal assistant, Tracy: (Sighs.) Yes, sir. We knew we were going to have an excess after the belugas, remember?
God: Right. All right: we're going to build another whale.
Tracy: Sir, with all due respect, we've been making a lot of whales this month and --
God: Fuck it. I'm not getting stuck with all this blubber. We're making a whale and we're making it huge.
Tracy: Yes, sir.

She enters the calculations into her Macbook.

Tracy: How about this? It's significantly bigger than the other specimens.
God: No, no. Make it bigger.
Tracy: Sir?
God: Bigger.
Tracy: OK... how's that?
God: Bigger, damnit.
Tracy: Sir? We've never made an animal this large. Not even the dinosaurs --
God: What part of "bigger" is giving you trouble? Step aside.

God takes the mouse.

Tracy: Uh. Wow. That's... really big.
God: That's what I'm talking about. That's a big fucking fish.
Tracy: Mammal.
God:
Tracy: I beg your pardon, sir.
God: Any ideas for colour? That's not really my department.
Tracy: Blue? I don't know --
God: Done. Blue whale. Name it, make a hundred thousand, move on to birds. I gotta grab some lunch, I'm starving.

After spending time with Eve

Adam was walking in the Garden with God. He told God how much the newly created woman means to him and how blessed he feels to have her. Adam began to ask God questions:

Adam: Lord, Eve is beautiful. Why did you make her so beautiful?
God: So you will always want to look at her.
Adam: And Lord, her skin is so soft. Why did you make her skin so soft?
God: So you will always want to touch her.
Adam: She always smells so good. Lord, why did you make her smell so good?
God: So you will always want to be near her.
Adam: That's wonderful Lord, and I don't want to seem ungrateful, but why did you make her so stupid?
God: So she would love you.

Adam pondered this for a moment.

Adam: That doesn't make any sense.
God: Now go, cultivate the Garden, and keep it safe.
Adam: No, no, hold up. Was that supposed to be some kind of an insult? Like you're trying to be clever or something?
God: Son...
Adam: Because, you know, you created me too, so I'm not exactly sure how that's an insult.
God: She is only human, Adam. She is of bone taken from your bone, and flesh from your flesh.
Adam: That doesn't explain why she's retarded. And look, if you didn't want us to eat from the tree of knowledge, why did you create it? Am I missing something? Honestly God, I really don't understand how you operate sometimes.

And God rolled his eyes, having experienced man's philosophy for the first time.

God: Listen, my work is done; deal with it. If you don't mind, I'm going to go take a long nap.

You perish ignited

Indeed, I uttered to merry Jane
It will be long so let's play a game
So while I sit fuming merrily
You perish
Ignited
Between my teeth

I lift you up off the yonder plate
Ensconced by fingers your fragile weight
Our breaths transposèd amidst our kiss
Your sweet death
By my hand
Your slow dismiss

But lo! And this is where you came in
Before embarking on mortal sin
I was a suicide referee
My sweet death
By my hand
My own marquee

Alas, I could never sign the mark
The note expected to flame the dark
Instead I fold you and speak your name
You perish
Ignited
You take the blame

The second last temptation of Christ

A rare nugget of spiritual teaching from my childhood:

Harvey: Daddy, where did the Easter bunny come from, and why does he leave chocolate eggs for me to find?
Dad: Son, long ago there was a man named Jesus Christ. The prophets foretold his birth, and that he was the Messiah. He was God's only son, and he came to Earth to redeem man and die for his sins, which he did when he was crucified by the Romans--
Harvey: Daddy? What about the Easter bunny?
Dad: I'm getting to that, son. You see, Jesus was nailed to the cross, where he bled to death. And as he was dying, he was growing delirious, and weak, and he cried out: "There will be bunnies! And they shall leave chocolate in orbs. Come to the chocolate, and find it. The Kingdom of God will wait for those with eggs. On Judgment Day you will need those eggs. And there will be cream filled varieties as well."
Harvey: Really?
Dad: Yes. And then he died, but they lost him or something, and now he's in Heaven with God. Or somewhere in the Middle East. Now go to bed, son.

My conversation with God (already in progress)

Harvey: Look, I get it. But don't you want us all to be happy?
God: That's not --
Harvey: Just answer the fucking question, dude.
God: I will not be interrupted.
Harvey:
God:
Harvey: OK, sorry about that. What were you saying?
God: It doesn't matter anymore.
Harvey: No, come on, I'm sorry. I'll let you talk. Please go on.
God: I was going to say: that's not important to true happiness. You must realise Harvey, that there is more to your existence than pleasuring women, and having money, and Dance Dance Revolution.
Harvey: Really?
God: Yes.
Harvey: Yeah, right. Like what?
God: You must try to find peace amidst the chaos--
Harvey: Bullshit dude you-- oh, shit. Sorry about that.
God:
Harvey: Dude. Please go on.
God: You have closed your mind to understanding.
Harvey: Look, clearly this conversation is just stressing us both out. Can we change the subject?
God: Fine.
Harvey: Are you mad? Look, I'm sorry.
God: I am not angry.
Harvey: Are you sure? You seem angry at me.
God: The creations of this world are holy and blameless in my sight.
Harvey: Right, so we're good. Sweet. So what are you up to later?
God: I am a timeless being, Harvey. I cannot experience the passage of time.
Harvey: Oh, here we go. I'm just making small talk! Why do you have to pull this omnipotent being shit all the time?
God:
Harvey: Are you still mad because I interrupted you? Christ -- uh, I mean... Criminy...?
God:
Harvey: You're still mad, aren't you?
God:
Harvey: You know what? Fuck this, I'm outta here!

I slammed the door to my dreams and sat up with a start. I was at my parents’ place, on a thin mattress laid out on the living floor. "Dude?" I asked out loud, but only the click of the furnace answered me.

But wait: he's dead, I realised, my thoughts beginning to focus. He's dead and we're alone in the universe.

I went back to sleep, tired and feverish. I get this way sometimes. This is what happens when you snort NeoCitran.

Meta melee or: an overdue why

A confidential letter to my audience of one,

Hey.

Since you are reading this, my diary of my personal ramblings and partially-digested creative concoctions, I can safely assert that you are on some level, a creepy lurker. Of course by the same token, the fact that I know that you are here probably makes me just as creepy (and lurky). Considering all this, it's a wonder we're not better friends.

Writing something this overt is somewhat cringe inducing for me -- especially considering this blog's narrative conceit. And I apologize for the face-warming sense of embarrassment that reading such a missive may cause; laundry lists about things I hate are far more palatable, I know.

But at least this post is unique; for what may be the first time in my writing I am trying to make a point. But I'm not sure what that point is.

The fact is, the moment our relationship crumbled from an virtual epistolary into meta e-lurking extravaganza, things have not been the same. And those short but sweet moments of contact in the Real World, though awkward, were actually -- OK, they were awkward. Let's leave it at that.

But oddly, after all this time -- here you are. Pondering that, I realise that maybe I'm not trying to make a point at all, but rather trying to clarify one.

You are (still) here, and reading this jumble of half-truths, bizarre belles-lettres and bulk incongruity, and I don't mind at all. I just don't know why. For the witty dialogues and poetry about soap? Surely not.

So I am left bemused, and possibly writing to a spectre, and asking the long overdue "why"? It really is my favourite question, but it's the hardest for me to ask. (I'm easily stunned by contradictions.) By the time I get around to it, the end credits are rolling skyward and the audience has begun its slow shuffle into the aisles.

So why are you here, my gentle reader? And to close with an opener: how have you been?

Yours truly,

Harvey


P.S. Those were clearly rhetorical questions. This letter is obviously about God.