The scene changes to a small apartment kitchen/dining room. The man has prepared two plates of food, beans from a can and a soda. He doesn’t bother to heat the beans and the soda is from a pile of cans beside the refrigerator. The light source is a camping lantern. The man eats and reminisces.
This all started … what was it … five years ago, now! My goodness, how time flies when you have nothing to do!
“It” began just as my friends and I headed for two weeks in upstate Maine. We pledged a serious get-away-from-it-all: No cell phones, no PDA, no GPS, no satellite … just us and the wild country.
We’d done this before and loved the “battery recharging” it gave us. So we knew what to bring and what we would stock up on at Joe’s Bait Shop, our last flirtation with civilization.
I should say now that there’s a lot of luck in why I’m here now, talking to you. I remember that Joe had the TV on and just as we were leaving, there was a news report that some cranks had reported Jesus had come back to Earth.
We laughed as we left, got in the canoes, and headed across the lake to as close to nowhere as you could get in Maine … and that’s pretty darn close, I might add.
As we paddled across the lake that news report became our first topic of conversation.
“So Jesus has come again … again,” laughed Johnny.
“I still remember what John Lennon had to say about Jesus coming,” said Bill. “That unless he spent a whole lot of money, the Beatles would be more popular.”
We all laughed at that.
“But what if he does come again?” continued Johnny.
“Then those who are faithful pack their bags and head for the Pearly Gates. It’s Judgment Day, son,” said Bill.
“Actually, these days, that part is called Rapture,” said Jack.
Ironically, he was not far off.
We talked of all sorts of things on those journeys … religion, politics, history, technology. We were a mixed bag, but what we all had in common was loving to talk about new stuff and new ideas.
I remember now that we spent a good hour talking about free will. I argued that if you have faith, how can you have free will? When you come to have faith, you’re being asked to believe in something just because it feels good, not because there’s any physical evidence that it’s true. If there’s no truth to faith, where’s the free will?
Jack said, “Because it feels right, not just good. But you won’t know what you’re talking about until you actually have faith.”
We couldn’t get around that difference, so we moved on to other topics.
Free will … as we paddled across that lake into the quiet of evening, none of us had any idea how important that was to become.
The first disturbing sign of “It” happened a week into our retreat. Jack came out to the dinner campfire with his PDA in his hand. He was the techno-junkie of the group, so it was the latest, and he was staring down at it as he came to the group.
Bill frowned, looked around to do a head count, then said, “Who broke a leg?” It was one of our house rules that we only brought out the tech stuff if we were reporting some kind of emergency.
Jack said, “There’s some really weird stuff going on back in the real world.”
Bill was angry. “That’s nice, but I won’t care for a week.” He was an impulsive guy, and he’d been crabby all day from the runs. He grabbed Jack’s PDA and threw it into the lake.
Jack was not happy. “Hey! If we’d had a nuclear war, you’d like to know about it, wouldn’t you?”
Bill said, “Did we have a nuclear war?”
Jack said, “No, but Jesus really did come. That’s what my wife was telling me.”
“Bullshit,” was Bill’s reply, and what we were all thinking.
“She says if you see him, you won’t say that … and I believe her. In fact … I think I see my PDA … the LCD is still lit.”
I couldn’t believe it. It was after dark, and Jack jumped into that cold lake water with all his clothes on! Jesus, what a fool! No PDA is worth losing your health over!
Oh … I guess I shouldn’t say “Jesus” anymore … Old habits die hard.
He did come up with that stupid PDA, but by then the water had shorted it out. We got him dried off quickly, but he shivered all night and by next morning he had a fever.
Now we did have a semi-emergency. We watched Jack.
The surprising thing was, he was suffering but he was really happy. And he babbled a lot about this Jesus-being-on-Earth business. He said his wife told him it was so, and she put a video clip of him in the message—a video clip of this Jesus fellow. He saw it and he believed too. He was going to show the rest of us that night … before his PDA got tossed.
We agreed if he hadn’t improved by the next morning we needed to take him back.
He didn’t, so we did. The wind was at our backs and we made good time getting back. We hit Joe’s Bait Shop early in the afternoon. Luck favored me again. I was expecting that we’d finish the week in the woods. I was feeling primitive and didn’t want to lose that feeling, so I stayed outside and moved Jack’s stuff to his car.
As I was moving stuff, and getting impatient to get back on the lake again, Bill came out with a funny look on his face. He looked … too happy is the best way to put it.
He said to me, “It’s true. Jesus did come. I saw him on the TV inside and it’s really him.”
I told him bullshit, but looking at him look so strangely happy really was scaring me. This was the Bill that two days ago was so grumpy he threw Jack’s PDA in the lake.
“Suit yourself,” he said, and he walked back in. I waited, but no one came out. It was so strange.
I don’t know why I stayed out there on the dock. … I don’t know why I chose to get back in the canoe and paddle away by myself. … I do know I’m telling you this story today because I did.
The man gets an ear-to-ear grin as he says this.
Hah! What a joke! I’m busy telling hallucinations my life’s story!
The man looks around and sighs,
Then again … who else am I going to tell? … You haven’t touched your food, by the way. Let’s not waste it.
The man swaps plates and starts eating from what was the guest plate.