The dad machine

Looking in from the outside you can see a red suction cup on the full length glass door. Attached to the the suction cup is a thin white string and it leads to a funny looking contraption. The funny looking object is a combination of a television and radio that is some how joined to work together.

It takes a little bit of time to figure out where I am and what is going on. It dawns on me I am at the house I grew up in, but like most dreams how they merge objects and scenarios into one I realize that I am on the deck of my current house and I am looking in the glass door that I can look out any time that I want right now. The furniture inside is the furniture that I currently sit on. The 2 main differences are 1. the house is different and 2. I am no longer among the living.

This is my utopia, the ability to spend my eternity watching over my two beautiful children and my wonderful wife. What makes it better is the suction cup with the white string leading to the "dad machine" that Tucker has created to look in on me when he misses me. This is the one creation that is able to stay in place where all others are put away by the end of the day.

This was one of the very vivid experiences I had in the Neuro ICU.

I remember it so well, almost too well. Before I had my seizures, I thought I had made my peace with this world. When I say this I hope it is understood that if I happen to pass away into the next world that I would be OK with it and ready for it to happen. It turns out that I am not sure I have made all the peace.

I say this because the same night I experienced my utopia, I also experienced what my total nightmare would be to spend my eternity. The nightmare experience would be to spend my eternity trapped in one place forever not being able to move only looking at the same thing forever. It happened to be the ceiling over the bed I was in at ICU. It did not help that the nurse taking care of me that particular night was wearing all red, or that I was "leathered" to the bed but that is for another day.

I came to call this the night I experienced purgatory. What a relief I had when I was talking to my clergy about this experience and they explained to me that our faith does not believe in purgatory - whew!!