During my Illness
A New Age friend called to say she was visualizing me bathed in a rose-colored, healing light. A Buddhist friend said she would put a photo of me on her altar and chant Om for me every day. A psychic-cousin called to say she saw angels hovering above my head. A sister sent me a recording of a famous healer who teaches people how to change their energy and heal their lives. An evangelical aunt said she was praying for me day and night, and she put me on a prayer list so that her church friends were praying for me, too. An uncle suggested I take ice baths or consider flying to Maine and plunging into the wintry sea. My therapist advised me to practice breathing exercises and to take sunrise walks. A salesclerk at the crystal shop sold me a tiny diamond-shaped crystal and instructed me to keep it in my pocket when I went to my next doctor’s appointment—which reminded me of how, when I was a girl, my father gave me a rabbit’s foot before eye surgeries. He said it was a left rabbit’s foot and I should keep it in my left pocket and touch it with my left fingers because that’s how the magic works.
Englightenment.com
Thank you for dialing Enlightenment.com where spiritual needs can be met in a holy instant. Rest assured that all our assistants are angels of the highest order who already know your every wish and desire. Who understand that life is suffering, that it cannot end well. Who, for a small fee, will offer tips on how to be less human: less stressed, less self-involved, less impatient, less lonely, less jealous, less angry, less proud, less of a dick. If you are a total dick, I’m sorry. We cannot help you. Please hang up and do not call back. If you are merely a partial dick, you may press 4, sit back and relax while listening to our angels’ specially composed and patented Muzak of the Spheres, which will purify your mind and soul in a mellifluous sound bath. Press 5 and have your credit card ready if you would like to download your own personal copy. If you feel that something is still missing, as if hum is gone from your humdrum days, press 6 to discover a portal to another world. The portal is our premium offer and will lead your soul to a sacred kingdom where there is no you—no story of you, not even a hint of the you who pees in showers, peeks through the blinds at the neighbor’s pubescent daughter, fingers the icing off your wife’s Bundt cakes before the guests arrive, who says no problem instead of thank you or you’re welcome. Now at last you can say good riddance to yourself as you become a single small cloud dissolving into our celestial night.
I Ask My Doctor Not to Pray for Me
My doctor worries when I tell him I am an atheist. He informs me that devout patients suffer less and have higher survival rates; I should learn to get down on my knees. On his wall is a picture of Jesus, his long strawberry blond locks falling forward, his blue eyes downcast, as if lost in thought or time or maybe a dialog with the bearded god in the clouds. His face is familiar, but I can’t quite place him. Then I remember—he was in my high school class though he was held back a few years—a sixties flower child, Vietnam war protestor who smoked pot, played the guitar, and hung out with the fast crowd and never gave me a second glance. Years later I read that he was one of the boytoys for our parish priest, Father Thomas, who was known for offering spiritual direction to troubled youth. I want to ask if he’s okay now, but he’s wrapped in a sorrow so deep, no words rise from his throat.
The Afterlife
facts from the Pew Research Center
80% of Americans believe in God.
75% of Americans believe in heaven, even if few can define heaven.
70% believe in angels.
65% say they will reunite with their loved ones in the afterlife.
60% believe they will regain their youthful bodies in heaven, but don’t say how youthful the bodies will be.
45% believe their beloved pets will be waiting for them in heaven.
44% believe they can interact with the dead.
41% believe in ghosts.
20% have been touched by ghosts.
3% are atheists.
2% of atheists believe they can go to heaven.
A single atheist believes in angels. She says it is possible to carry a vision of a seraph in her mind and heart, to feel his skin across lifetimes, to hear his voice when the tea kettle sings and the wind lifts the curtains or the dishes clatter in the sink or the blackbird calls out conk-la-ree, to taste his mouth every time she speaks, closing her lips into a soft kiss when she says her m’s and p’s, every time she licks an l or an n, or trips over a t, or with every s and z that sizzles like a drop of water on a hot frying pan before turning to mist.
