I have to take a class to get into heaven?

Has anyone ever told you its impossible to die in one of your own dreams?  I don't know why but time and time again I have heard people argue this.  It doesn't seem like that big a deal, but people don't just agree with this idea, they will passionately defend it.  

The typical argument goes that, if you die in your dream you die in real life, that no matter what the scenario is in your dream, you will always wake up an instant before you hit the ground, or that bullet hits your face, or that dinosaur bites your head off.

They always have a reference to back it up too, "I learned in class," or "I read a study," or "I heard it on the news."   Well I'd like to point out how literally impossible it would be to determine if someone who died in their dream died in real life.  If someone dies in their sleep, how on earth can you know what they were dreaming about?

So maybe you would argue that nobody who wakes up claims they have died in their dream, but that's where I'm going to have to step into the picture because I have successfully survived a dreamt death.

The dream started with a doctor talking to me about a terminal illness I had, and told me I had until 6 p.m. the next day to live, 24 hours. 

How I spent my last day is foggy, I can't recall anything specific but I know I was at my house in Roanoke and my family and friends were there.

When 6 p.m. rolled around I was still alive, but thought about how odd it would be for the doctor to have such a specific down to the second death clock on me.  I managed to hold on for another hour, at 7 p.m. I died.

(I remember when I woke up the next day I was proud of my dream self for fighting to hold on for another hour)

I was alone when it happened, in my room, on my computer, checking facebook (my last act, how embarrassing) and I noticed St. Peter had a facebook page, I clicked on it, and instead of going to his page, he came out of the computer and informed me that I had just died and he would be bringing me up to heaven.

I had always imagined heaven to be an white ethereal cloudy place, but to my surprise we arrived at a house that looked like it was much to big for itself.  It was lopsided and funny looking, and seemed to leaning over in every direction.  Although the house was made of wood, the top floor looked like a half deflated hot air balloon that was about to be drooping over the bottom floors.

Inside was just as wayward looking.  The picture frames weren't square or any recognizable shape for that matter, patches of floor were stuck to the wall, and the stair cases seemed to go to any floor except the ones they were directly below.  And perhaps most bizarre was that everything seemed to be covered in large hardened bubbles. 

I couldn't have been prepared for what happened next though, I was told I would have to take an orientation class before I could settle in.

That was the end of the dream, and I don't know what to make of it.  Anyone I try to talk to about it just starts arguing its impossible to die in dreams.

... maybe that's the first thing they correct you on in orientation.

No Time.

    How well can you judge the passage of time? I never really thought much of this but I recently discovered how incredibly bad I am it.

             I think most people would argue that they are relatively good at it, that even without a watch or clock they could guess the approximate time of day.  When is that ever the case though? Even now just sitting here I can read the time from my microwave, stove, TV, laptop and cell phone. 

The problem with me asking you to try this is that even if you get rid of all your clocks the amount of daylight still gives most people a pretty good estimate.  Well me and some friends put this experiment to the test and found out this: we have no idea what time it is. 

Spring break was upon us and we finally had the opportunity to live out an idea we had been talking about for at least a year: Cave Camping.  It’s a fairly simple idea and we certainly had the means to execute it. 

We have been exploring New River cave for the last 3 years it feels like.  Always taking new people and seeing how far back into the cave we can reach, but this time goal was just to stay overnight. 

A normal caving trip generally means wearing just enough to cover your arms and legs with out overheating once you get moving, a helmet, a headlight, and maybe a small backpack for food.  Basically as little as possible so that your body is as maneuverable as possible. 

So for cave camping we brought only the essentials. Fortunately that comes down to pretty much just a sleeping bag and a tarp.  Unfortunately our sleeping bags are large and resulted in my backpack being stuffed to capacity causing my back to grow a foot and a half hump.  So much for balance or maneuverability.

So how does this relate back to telling time?  Well as an added bit of fun we decided we weren’t going to bring in anything that could tell time to see if we could correctly estimate when morning was.

So it began, 10:30 p.m. we arrive and faced our first challenge: The Hill.  This can better be described as an 80 degree slope covered in mud and loose rocks, that taunts you with just out of reach slippery roots and dead trees for hand holds that drags on for 100 yards, and leads you to a rock climbing finish in the snow.

 I can assure you carrying my “extra back” did not make this any easier, but after about 15 minutes (we guessed) of struggling we reached the top all gasping for breath with our frozen lungs and set off into the cave.

Our destination was known as the Attic Room, one of the largest rooms in the cave where we hoped to find a suitable place to set up camp for 5 people.  Our regular speed in the cave was hindered by all the extra gear but we still made good time and after around 30 minutes (we guessed) we located the holy grail of cave camping locations.

A large flat slab of rock covered in soft dirt in an open room with high ceilings. That might sound pleasant but the fact is, sleeping on a rock is still sleeping on a rock; it sucks.

            I can’t decide if that rock was a blessing or a curse.  For the most part we all assumed we would incorrectly guess the passage of time, that we would go in, set up, fall asleep, be awoken by the discomfort of sleeping on rocks, decide we’d had enough and depart emerging at around 2 or 3 in the morning.

            Through the dirt, tarp and sleeping back though the rock was just at the lowest level of unprefered comfort.  We persevered and just lay there talking for two or three hours (we guessed).

            If you have never been in a cave it’s hard to describe just how dark it really is in there.  There is absolutely no light, you could sit for hours, eyes wide open, and never adjust.  You will never see anything with out the help of a light.  There is no face to go with the voices, no difference between eyes open and eyes closed.

            When you doze off at home watching TV it’s pretty obvious when you wake up because everything is bright again.  When that indication is gone its very possible you may not even know you were asleep.

 I was the first to experience this, I just chimed in at the end of a story and to my surprise everyone cheered, excited that I was awake.  I argued that I had been awake the whole time.  Everyone broke into laughter at my unawareness, I began to argue more frustrated that they could think they knew better than me if I was conscious or not.  They argued back with the smug attitude of someone who knows the answer to a clever riddle and all at once said I’d been snoring.  Game Over.

For the rest of the trip nobody got any comfortable sleep.  Everyone drifted lazily between the line of consciousness and sleep.  Constantly being awoken by discomfort, tiny bat squeaks, or the cool damp cave air. 

How long you were every asleep was impossible to tell it could have been five minutes or three hours.  Once everyone had fallen asleep at least once the game really was over: time had eluded us. 

I remember feeling hungry at one point, and having to pee, at some point.  Both are things I normally take care of in the morning but it had only been two hours (I guessed) since my sandwich so I brushed it aside as my body just reacting to the boredom of lying there.

We decided at some point that rested or not it was time to go. Stiff, grumpy, and damp, we packed up our gear and headed for the exit.  We made good time again (we guessed) and it felt like 20 minutes later we could feel the temperature drop indicating the outside air was not far off.

Everyone made time guesses, ranging from four to seven in the morning, and we joked about where we would get breakfast so early, and how we’d be sleeping till three once we got home. 

The moment of truth arrived, it seemed that the seven’o’clocks had it, the sun had certainly risen behind an overcast sky and we had a gorgeous view of the river below.  My friend flicked open his phone and turned it on.  We watched his face.

His expressions changed quickly. Laughter. Confusion. Worry. Disbelief. 

“1:02 p.m.”

Our jaws dropped.  Even our best guess was six hours off, it wasn’t even morning, and already half the day was gone.  How long had we lay there convincing ourselves to stay just a little longer so we didn’t come out to early?  Were my hunger and bathroom urges right on Q? 

Even now I don’t know how we lost that much time, the only explanation we could come up with was that at some point everyone had fallen asleep for an extended period of time without realizing it.

I invite you to try it, truly isolate yourself from time, something you check probably 20 times a day with out thinking, what you schedule your life around I think you’ll be surprised how completely unaware of it you really are.

Now if you’ll excuse me its time for dinner (I’m guessing).

 

 

 

 

           

           

           

 

            

Forced to Shuffle

I remember when the coolest thing my iPod could do was "shuffle."  My taste in music isn't very well defined.  My iTunes library is a solid 628 songs small, made up of a messy selection of country music, lots of Jimmy Buffet, and a who-knows-what collection of 90's and classic rock, and whatever else people have suggested to me over the years right down to the Ninja Turtle rap by Vanilla Ice.

Now my iPod touch can do almost anything I ask it to, I can be on facebook at all hours of the day, check the news, play games and... oh yea listen to music.  The music is of course why I still carry it with me everywhere and I still love the shuffle function.  I never have any idea what I want to listen to and it takes away that immense pressure from my shoulders.

Because of my incredibly random selection of music though the shuffle is very hit or miss.  Somedays it chooses the perfect blend Kenny Chesney and ACDC to suit my mood while other days it jumps from Coldplay to 50 cent in a most unpleasing fashion.  Fortunately all I have to do to solve my problem is just keep hitting next until I get what I want.  It's a simple luxury I never thought twice about until it was taken away from me.

Classes were over for the day and I managed to catch the early bus back to my apartment.  Because riding public busses generally involves being forced into awkwardly close proximity to strangers I planned ahead and popped my earbuds in, hit the shuffle and dropped my iPod into my back jeans pocket.  I was free to be disconnected from everyone around me.

As the unwritten rules of the bus go, you never sit next to anyone you don't know with out at least a one seat buffer unless the bus becomes so crowded that its the only way to make extra standing room.

Upon boarding I was not one of the lucky people who would be sitting down, the only open seat I could see was in the very back in the middle seat of the 5 seater bench; I'll pass.  As luck would have it though the next stop, 50 yards up the road, filled the bus to capacity, and in the process forced people to move further and further back.

Fear raced through me, I knew what was about to happen, I was being forced to the middle bench seat, it was the only way there would be enough standing room.  Squish.  The whole bench was as uncomfortable as me, or so they thought...

My iPod was unreachable, there was absolutely no room to be reaching around that area as I sat literally cheek to cheek with the people on either side of me. I was at the mercy of the shuffle.  

As Crazy Frog came blasting into my ears I considered taking the earbuds out, but no as the occupant of the middle seat it was my obligation to the people around me to look as removed from reality as possible.  God forbid they think for a moment I'm enjoying the situation forced upon us all.  Taking the earbuds out would have been irresponsible to society and I wasn't going to let them down.

I had to accept that for the next 15 minutes my iPod was in control of what I was thinking about and it seemed to be aware of this as Crazy Frog was replaced by the original Pokemon theme song (don't judge you know you have it). 

How could I be so powerless? Jessica Simpson was up next with "Let it Snow," yea thanks dad, you were right, we did need that for the family christmas video.

"Honkeytonk Badonkadonk," Do I really have to comment about that? half way there...

I guess the iPod was loving this because the next three were "What is love," "I Believe in a thing called love," and yes you guessed it, "Jizz in my Pants."

At long last I reached my stop, rushing off the bus I quickly silenced my iPod and walked home in silence.  How could I really be upset, I put all those songs on there, and its not like I don't enjoy them at the appropriate time.  I guess it was the lack of control over a tiny piece of technology I was distraught with.  

So I challenge you to try it, sit at your computer open your iTunes hit shuffle and then don't move for 15 minutes, I bet you'll be surprised what you've convinced yourself you need to have on your iPod at any moments notice.

Now if you'll excuse me I think I've found a downloadable video of that turtle rap...