The End

I just realized that I never followed up on the post about my friend. He died. That was given considering the state of his cancer, but what wasn't a given was the manner of his death. He spent the extra time he got after they fixed his cut carotid to reach out. It was amazing to watch, even through the tiny window of his Facebook wall. The real reconciliation, forgiveness even I hope, happened beyond public sight but the initial contacts often happened where we could all see it. He didn't die alone and he from the posts of those who were there with him at the end it seems he found some measure of peace.

But I will point out one thing that annoyed me. My friend was an atheist just as I am, he went as far as to described himself as a militant atheist. As his condition worsened and he could no longer respond directly more and more people put blatantly religious messages on his wall. I'm not talking about things like "We're praying for you." sentiments that are fully understandable and well meant. No, there were a bunch of posts that started with things like "Dear being of peace and light..." one of which was written by some kind of spiritual leader of one of his friends. That's going too far, way too far. If my friend had been healthy he would have expressed his displeasure at those sentiments in a way that would have been brutal, profane and very, very funny.

This is the oblivion of religious privilege, the inability to understand that while sincere best wishes are usually welcome by atheists even when religiously couched, proselytising is inappropriate. The deathbed conversion is a myth that religious folks repeat because facing death without a belief in an afterlife of some sort is incomprehensible to them.

I didn't take any of these folks to task for two reasons. First because I recognise that everyone grieves in their own way and despite the inappropriate nature of those posts no harm was intended. Second and most importantly, I couldn't speak for my friend in this matter. There is no atheist big book of multiple choice for me to consult. No dogma, no tradition, no religious formula to inform me. It would have been as inappropriate for me to speak for my friend without knowing his exact thoughts on the matter as it was for people to use his affliction to spread their dogma. Sometimes free thought is limiting and I wouldn't have it any other way.

As final thought I want to point out just how important Facebook was in all of this. He died at least in part in the pubic space of Facebook. A temporary community formed, and together we were stronger than we could have been alone. This is the true strength of humanity, our ability to reach out and help each other. Facebook gets a lot of criticism for its triviality, and perhaps that criticism is deserved. But in the end it's simply a means of communication and what is communicated is up to those who use it.

Complicated

I just watched the Dr. Who episode "When a Good Man Goes to War". There's something about that phrase that moves me.

A good man, I like to think of myself as such. To be good is something I aspire to in all of my life. I work alone and I own the business, there's no oversight bar my wife who isn't there most days. I could easily tell folks that their bike requires repairs that they don't in fact need. I could even supply used parts from previous repairs to back up such claims. There is little chance I could get caught. I won't ever do that. I don't fear being caught, I don't fear punishment. I fear not being a good man. I fear it because the only thing that has stopped evil in all of history is the willingness of folks to be good.

I've never been in a war. I will never be in a war, not at my age, not as a combatant anyway. But I have been in mortal danger a time or two. I once worked a job where on multiple occasions I was robbed at knife point. The last time it happened I hit the guy and chased him out of the store. It was a dumb thing to do, I was very lucky I didn't get hurt, didn't get killed. I didn't do it because I was good, or because I wanted to do good. I did it because I suddenly realised he couldn't reach me. In that instant my fear turned to anger and I acted.

I make no claims that my experience is equivalent to going to war. But it was a taste of fear and danger that goes beyond the bounds of most daily life in the privileged western world in which I live. That act, hitting someone, lashing out, even though it was justified, it changed me. I knew then that I was capable of unthinking violence. I'd been in fights before as a teenager and during all of them all I wanted was for it to stop. No wonder I never won any of them. This was different.

When a good man goes to war, if he is indeed a good man, then he must believe that that war is justified. Even if that belief is correct that man can not help but to be changed. This is why we must go to war only with the greatest of reluctance and in full knowledge of the consequences. This too is why it is so important to be good, to strive to be good, because the veneer of civilization is so thin. We all have the capacity for all the possible actions people are capable of. To be anything less is to be less than human.

When a good man goes to war. That phrase touches me. So sad, so complicated, so human.

Ah Fuck.

An old band mate of mine is in palliative care. He has four tumors eating his throat and face. From the sounds of it he hasn't much time left and I'm on the other side of the world.

I can't say I was a good friend for I wasn't. He had problems, bad problems with drugs that lead to a life that I could not, and would not, be a part of. I cut him loose and never really looked back. But now I am looking back and I've realized that many of the things that annoyed me the most about him were in fact his way of trying to help me.

Sure, his idea of helping was, for example, to suggest that heroin would be of some benefit to me. I said no for obvious reasons, but the strange thing is that he was right, or at least partly right. I was an insecure, uptight little tosser when we first met. And if there's one thing about heroin, it does mellow a person out.

I'm not being naive here, I know that part of his motivation was to have someone else share his addiction in order make some money to pay for said addiction. I know too that he wanted the people around him to act as he did in order to feel normal about his behavior. But when I put this incident together with all the other times he annoyed me enough to remember it these 20 years later, I realize that at the bottom of every incident there was always an intent, however small, to help.

I regret not noticing that sooner.

For all his faults, for all the damage he did to himself and others, he isn't an evil man. And now he's laying in a fogged stupor not of his own choosing, unlike all the ones that went before. He's laying there waiting for the cancer to cut his carotid artery again, or close off his esophagus, or to cause pain so unbearable that never fully awakening again is the only option.

He does not deserve this, and fuck any self-righteous pricks who dare to suggest that he does. I've heard that there have been a few of those around, even on his medical team. He's human, flawed to be sure, but no less deserving of love and compassion for all of that.

The Big Empty

So, are you scared? Is the world too big for you, does it overwhelm you with its complexity.Yes? Well then, I suggest you stay far, far away from telescopes and microscopes.

The scale of the universe in which we live, from the outer reaches of observable interstellar space 46.5 billion lights years away to the Plank length infinitesimal minuteness of the subatomic realm is vast almost beyond comprehension. We as a species are not equipped to observe these extremes without resorting to instruments that enhance our senses to superhuman levels. And at the very outer edges of the largest and the smallest we have to rely on math to map and explain what is there. Those edges at present are beyond our ability to detect directly.

How do we cope with this near infinity that surrounds us? One option is to make stuff up, to invent a wise and benevolent entity that not only understands it all but is somehow responsible for it all. Then all one has to do is wrap one's self up in the warm security blanket of revealed wisdom to feel safe. Of course one has to ignore the fact that the blanket no longer stretches to cover lightning, earthquakes, floods and plagues. Or that the parts that used to cover the motions of the stars and planets, the seasons and eclipses are now just frayed holes. "Fine, fine." one could say "Static electricity, plate tectonics, the water cycle and germs are just the ways that our entity does things." But here's the rub, none of these things requires an entity to sustain them. They work just fine all by themselves. As our body of knowledge grows larger and larger the security blanket gets smaller and smaller until one is left twisting and turning, pulling the blanket here and there in a futile attempt to hide from the reality in which we live.

It's a vast, hostile universe in which we live, one that cares nothing for you or me. Less than nothing really, because that phrase "it cares nothing" is misleading. There is nothing there that is capable of caring one way or the other. And therein lies the joy.

You see, we're not alone and we're not helpless. We have each other and that's enough, more than enough. Don't believe me? Take someone you love by the hand, look in their eyes and say "I'm here." How big is the universe at that moment? How scary? Do you need your ragged and fading security blanket to warm you as arms, alive and real, hold you?

We're all together in the big empty and it's going to be alright.

More Adventures in the 3 Year Old's Brain

Me: Em, just how did your toes get so big, hmmmm?

Em: I'm getting bigger.

Me: Yup, you are. How big are you going to get?

Em: Bigger, and bigger, and bigger, and bigger, and Bigger, And Bigger, AND Bigger, AND BIGGER, VERY BIG!

Me: [uncovers ears, starts to say "Not so loud" but is interrupted]

Em: I'm going to be as big as you Daddy!

Me: You might be.

Em: But with hair.

Squeeee!

I'm so happy. I just got my first ranting anti-atheist comment, despite not having written much if anything about the subject here. Someone tracked me back from another website where I'd commented and left this incoherent screed. Hilarious.