Poprocks for the Soul

A feeling, like walking into a sunbeam but a thousand times more and instead of coming from the outside it’s coming from within. I can’t see a thing but it feels like purple. I can’t hear a thing, but wait maybe I can… it’s like a thumping sound, familiar but far off like I’m underwater and it’s on the surface. The edges of the sound are as blurred as this feeling. Expanding in waves from my heart with tiny exploding tinglies on those undefined edges like Poprocks for the soul. It’s as if some glorious giant spilled a glass of awesomeness on the table and instead of wiping it up that non-binary beautiful being just lets it flow outward. Out toward the boarders of the table (of my body) what happens when it reaches the end? Nothing the feeling continues flowing because there are no boarders, no limits. It floats on and takes me with it. We are expanding and becoming one with the universe with everything. I can almost glimpse the grand scheme and my heart swells unbelievably. The meaning, the purpose, the whole enchilada is right in front of me, I almost have it, just a little closer…

I find myself sitting in white room at a white desk across from a pleasant looking fellow about my age who is currently reading a newspaper. He glances at me, nods politely then retreats back to his news. I reach for my phone out of habit.

“There are no phones here,” the guy says from behind his paper. “It’s really quite wonderful when you get used to it. With phones everything is so urgent,” he flips the pages loudly, “without them your brain really has a chance to stretch.”

“What,” I ask. I feel a little drunk. Like the best part of the buzz when it just hits you.

“Ok,” the man says and folds his paper. “You seem a bit chatty so let’s chat.”

“We don’t have to,” I say, not wanting to disturb my new friend. My new friend, huh, “We don’t have to talk if you don’t feel like it.”

“Oh no,” he smiles. “I’ve been waiting a very long time for somebody to talk to.”

And for some reason I feel guilty.

“I was saying without a phone or Google your brain has to think for itself. No easy answers anymore. For example, I’ve really got to get in there, shuffle some papers around and dust off those old bookshelves to remember what actor said “Cheeee-eeese” in that way that always makes me laugh.”

“I remember that line,” I do, but I don’t it’s just out of reach, a feeling I’m getting very familiar with now.

“Vince Vaughn,” the man saves me.

“Old School, I love that movie!” I say a little louder and a little more excited than I mean to. Not only do you have to think without a phone but you also have to (get to) have IRL conversations.

“Who doesn’t!” the man’s excitement matches my own.

“FRANK THE TANK! FRANK THE TANK!” we shout in unison and pump our arms like a Will Farrell locomotive. You know it!

“Am I a good person?” I ask suddenly.

“Why you ask that?” the man crosses his arms and leans back in his chair.

“I don’t know,” I admit. “Just seemed like the right time, I guess.”

“It’s always to the right time to ask to if you are a good person. A question that should probably be asked much more than it is. What do you think makes a person good?”

“A good person does the right thing even if it costs them. They add more to the world then they subtract.”

“That’s poetic and mathematical, but why do the right thing? Why give more than you take?”

“To go to Heaven,” I ponder and my new friend’s brows furrow, “or to stay out of Hell?”

“I was in Heaven. I was in Hell. Believe in neither but fear both as well,” the man sang loudly while banging his head. 

“Modest Mouse,” I tell him. I feel my brain beginning to stretch, no Google.

“Yes, to the band. No to the reason to be a good person. If you are a good to be rewarded or to avoid the punishment if you’re bad then you are lackey or a coward. I know you are neither of those. So again, why do the right thing?”

“Because doing the right thing feels good? But that seems selfish.”

“So what? Doing the right thing feels good because it is good. That’s how you know you did the right thing. Anybody who says you can’t be truly selfless if whatever good you do makes you feel good is overthinking or just pretentious.”

“What about guilt? Does feeling guilty make a person good?’

“Ah guilt, that great rock that so many religions chain their followers to. Feeling guilt is feeling bad. Why would feeling bad make you inherently good?” the man leans forward as he asks.

“If you feel bad when you did something bad it shows you care?”

“Everybody feels bad when they do something bad.” 

“Not sociopaths,” I tell him.

“How do you know? Are you a sociopath?” he asks, and I gulp like a cartoon character. “Everybody has good in them and everybody has bad in them. Some people, like sociopaths are just better at ignoring it. Would you even want to meet someone that was all good or all bad? The mind thwarts at the thought. Absolutely tha-warts!”

“I don’t know if you got that quote right, but close enough,” my mind is in full downward dog position now.

“It’s been awhile since I’ve read about Cuthbert and the gang.” He shrugs.

“So, what’s your problem with Heaven and Hell?”

“Hell is obvious. It’s fucking scary. Tyrants and Saints have both used it to terrify people into falling in line for eons. I wonder where people would be without the concept of Hell. Would we judge each other less, would we kill each other more? I would miss AC/DC, that’s for sure. As for Heaven… we’ve seen The Matrix.”

“Definitely,” I say with as much Keanu-tude as possible.

“Remember Agent Smith talking about how the first Matrix was a Utopia and people couldn’t handle it. We couldn’t wrap our heads around the fact that nothing was going wrong. That we were finally happy,” he puts his hands behind his head and leans back in his chair. “That concept is as scary to me as Hell itself. What if we finally get there and we don’t accept the program. That the shit doesn’t compute? Where do we go from there?”

“Maybe we come back and do it all again and again until we finally feel we like we deserve it. I was right there, man. I could almost see the it, but now the more I think about it the farther away it gets. Like an amazing dream that begins to erase itself as soon as you wake up.” I wish I could explain it better to him, but how do you tell somebody it felt like purple? Maybe Groovy Gravy could, but I'm no Groovy Gravy, baby.

“It’s not so much what we discovered or thought we discovered in that place, it’s the feeling that’s important. The feeling of being connected even when you think you’re all alone. Focus on that and the rest will come. I think you’re on the right track,” the man says sitting up again. “I like your style.”

“I like your moves,” I tell him and now I feel like our time is almost up. “I’m going to miss you, man.”

“I’m always with you. Every time you go to bed, when you sleep and every time you wake up.”

“That’s a touch much,” I say smiling, but kind of serious.

“You still don’t get it, or should we say I still don’t get,” the man shakes his head at me.

“Wait, what?” Something is dawning on me now. This guy is me. I am… me and that’s enough. Whoa.

Groovy. Now wake up.