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Heaven

The Source

Sometime just after Easter my friend and I have our usual theological dispute: Will there be coffee in heaven? He claims that such a notion is foolishness and I maintain that no self-respecting place dare call itself heavenly without the smell of freshly brewed java. And as usual….since I’m writing the article… he’s wrong. There are worse ways to spend a morning’s walking time in this most beautiful of seasons than to speculate on joys and social workings of heaven. I’ll leave others to speculate on the exact geography…I’d rather think about the ambiance of the place. Fresh asparagus served with a slab of smoked salmon and a Caesar salad on the veranda of a mountain chalet facing the Rockies just as the sun sets….How’s that for heaven? I’m specific as to the choice of food because I once ate a bison steak with salad and asparagus looking at the Rockies. Bison is not heaven. More like purgatory, it takes some additional prayer to get you to where you want to go. Walking through the Tulleries Gardens in Paris at sunset with a group of my students who have absolutely no access to any sort of wireless communication, their attention for the first time in their lives forced to dwell upon the present and tangible. Sure, a few of their fingers may involuntarily twitch their invisible I-gadgets sending text messages in the air, but, like a phantom limb, the sensation will soon pass as the heady fragrance, sights, and sounds of Paris begins to permeate their tech-soaked brains. Oh, the things they’ll see, Dr. Seuss! I once stood on the desk of a Carnival Cruise ship with a brandy in one hand and my binoculars in the other, watching the 10 p.m. sun set just as a frolicking pod of humpback whales turned the water’s surface into a rhinestone shimmer just a mile from the ship. I ignored both my drink and my binoculars and mused to myself, “This has got to be as close to heaven as I’ve ever been.” Maybe heaven is like Alaska without Sarah Palin. Okay, maybe you’re the type whose heaven is defined by what you get to do… parasailing, skidding down an Alaskan slope on a zip line, riding a horse across the Pampas, wearing your silk pajamas through Neiman Marcus on sale day, taking a long walk with a warm puppy. Me, I’m a big fan of sitting down. The first thing I plan to do in heaven is sit. Sitting is underrated as an all-American pastime and theologians have ignored it almost entirely. Sitting is holy. It’s Godly. Nowhere in the book of John’s Revelation does it mention “He who stands on the throne.” Of course, some people define heaven in terms of what’s not there. Were you to ask a few close friends what sort of things they’d not expect to find in heaven, you might be given a short list including 12-year-olds, telemarketers, “easy open” bottles of low fat ranch dressing, and blonds driving small red cars while talking on their cell phones. Frankly, I’ll allow any sort of annoyance into my heaven as long as I get there. And what music is best suited for heaven? Winston Churchill said, “I defy anyone to listen to Beethoven and deny the existence of God.” However, God’s existence and the perfect background music for eternity are two different issues. Earthquakes, floods, volcanic eruptions, and Fox News may prove the existence of God but I’m not sure I want their sounds piped into my heavenly elevator. Beethoven is grouchy, Bach is too busy, and Mozart requires thought. I recently walked by a 3rd grade music class singing “This land is your land! This land is my land!” Now that…that was heavenly. Smells? Let’s be frank, everything has a smell and I doubt that heaven’s any exception. Loads of perfume makers have applied the “heavenly” moniker to their products, and to my untrained nose the great majority of these expensive potions resemble nothing more than the fly spray we used to spritz on Angus show heifers at the Western Illinois Fair. When I take my first good whiff of heaven I’d expect to detect stray wisps of my grandfather’s Prince Albert pipe tobacco, Grandma Marie’s “apple stuff,” (that’s what she called her part-cobbler, part-pie, part-pudding conglomeration of nutmeg and Golden Delicious apples), my front yard after a spring rain, and Helen Dickens. (You probably don’t know Helen, but she always smells like lilacs.) After a bit of celestial speculation I’m forced to come back to earth and get real. I guess that at heart I’m a country boy more than anything else and my idea of heaven would be a night at home when the phone does not ring, no emails come dinging in, and there’s nowhere I need to go. Yeah…yeah, that’s ..well...heavenly. Oh…one more thing. Hollandaise sauce. Hollandaise on the asparagus. I’ve never tried it, but like heaven, I’ve heard it’s good.