Pretending – an essential death-rebel skill
Show Notes – Episode #2:
On Pretending – plus a bit more on Rebelling Against Death…
Pretending… any serious actor will agree that it’s a fine art. Yet hardly anyone but little children takes it seriously. For most of us, our imagination begins to atrophy from neglect after we pass the age of seven, and we never experience the power of pretending intentionally, with all our heart and soul.
That’s what this episode is about.
Before getting into that, however, I had to respond to a complaint from the first episode. One of our listeners reached out to explain they liked my poems and stories very much, but what exactly did I mean by “rebelling against death”?
That knocked me for a loop. After all, what I meant was perfectly clear to me! But once again I had to remember what I so often forget: that not everyone is just like me, and sees things the same way I do.
So in this, our second episode, I attempt to clarify what I meant. I talk about how in our culture death is taboo. But even though we don’t talk about it, and try not to think about it, the fear of it dogs our footsteps. We have a million ways to run away from it – but no matter what we do, how we distract ourselves, when we turn around, it’s still there: the mother of all fears, lurking just out of sight but never completely out of mind…
So most of us just keep running, trying to ignore it, until it’s on top of us. But there’s another option, something anyone with a little gumption can do: we can rebel against death.
By rebelling against death, I simply mean being fully alive, alive in every moment. This time I give a number of suggestions for how to do that, and tell the story of a good friend’s mother, my inspirational Death Rebel poster child, who lived happily to be over 100 and when asked her secret, said simply, “I always love what I do.”
We switch gears with a little song about an octopus in the closet, and then move on to the piece de resistance: the fine art of pretending.
Pretending is one of the most powerful tools in any death rebel’s tool chest. And like rebelling against death, it has both life-giving and life-dulling uses. We all know about the life-dulling uses – all the different forms of escape that the imagination can indulge in…
The life-giving uses, though less well-known, are just as available to all of us and just as doable. I talk about a few of the legion ways we can use pretending and the imagination to enliven us, to give us the strength and courage to battle even death itself. As testimony, I tell my own story of how pretending saved me from obsessive anxiety by putting me in touch with a deep inner peace.
Because it’s not true that we can only be happy in happy circumstances. With a little intentionality and heartfelt pretending, anyone can be happy even in a world like today’s, where violence erupts at the drop of a hat and fear and doubt loom everywhere…
We end this episode with a reading of my mid-pandemic epic poem: The Great 21st Century Poemic, and an invitation to drop in for one of our “play dates” in the Community of Silo’s Message…
The Great 21st Century Poemic
It struck one day
out of the blue,
cropping up all at once
in random spots
all across the planet
The first known cases
were a small boy
in Lincoln, Nebraska,
whom his mother found
one morning
reciting strange
and beautiful words
a small smile
on his small face
and
a grandmother
in Melbourne, Australia,
who was caught
that very same day
wandering the aisles
of a department store
reciting verses
from the Tang Dynasty
After that
the Poemic spread
lickety split
leaping like lightning
across whole continents
and oceans
In London
a mother of six woke up
spouting Tennyson
and in no time
her entire family was babbling
in iambic pentameter
In Buenos Aires a family
was stricken
with the odes of Pindar
in the original
ancient Greek
In Beijing
a whole neighborhood
was infested
with Billy Collins
And so it went.
How the Poemic was able
to spread itself
so far and wide
so fast
no one knew
At first
it was thought to be passed
simply through the spoken word
but soon
infectious particles
were discovered
hitching rides on sound waves,
in rays of sunlight
and even nestled
in random thoughts
Scientists also knew
that however it flew
it was always spewing out
more and more spores
that would land
take hold
and grow
anywhere
It was only
a matter of time
before the entire economy
of the world
had settled
into a deathly peaceful lull.
In the factories
no one stood on the assembly lines
In the banks
no one begged for loans
and no one doled them out
In the schools
no one taught the state curriculum
and no one was bored
Day after day
everyone
everywhere
simply dreamt the time away
to the murmured
declamation
of immortal poetry
both ancient
and new
Everyone assumed
that soon
the infection
would burn itself out
and things would go back
to normal
But instead
the Poemic only settled in
with a happy gurgle
sinking its teeth
deep into the tender underbelly
of the human genome
And so it went
for days
and weeks
and months
and years…
Suffice it to say
that to this day
no known victim
has ever recovered
This is perhaps
a loss for History
but all things considered
no one
seems to be
complaining
Because
after the first onslaught
things began to change
in quite unobjectionable ways
People began to go about their days
speaking in poetry
and fixing things
and before long
no one was going hungry
no one was left out in the cold
no one sick was left uncared for
no one old was forgotten
no one sad was ignored
and no one anywhere
was afraid
of dying lonely
and alone
Instead
people sang
while they made soup
and someone
was always baking cookies
Farmers smiled
at their cows
and hummed
while they fertilized their fields
Scientists
stopped scorning testimonies
of life after death
Physicians healed
by laying on of hands
Chemists formulated
harmless potions
that dissolved pain
Teachers
led children into the fields
to study bugs and flowers
and wade in streams
and catch pollywogs
Young people studied
what they loved
and got paid
in poems
That was how it happened
that people stopped hurting each other
and simply did
what needed to be done,
and when the time came for rest
they sat together on porches
and admired the way
the dust motes danced
in rays of the sun
And little by little
in every place
every last member
of the human race
began to wake up each day
with a smile on their face
for no rational reason
at all.
happy and peaceful
in every way
for no rational reason at all.
Pretending: An Essential Death Rebel Skill
Music:
Intro and outro: “Follow Me”
Octopus interlude: “Little struggles”
Both tunes by IRCarus Ensemble, Portland, Oregon, 2021