Alice came to a fork in the road. “Which road do I take?” she asked.
“Where do you want to go?” responded the Cheshire cat.
“I don’t know,” Alice answered.
“Then,” said the cat, “it doesn’t matter.”
~Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland
I lived on the 23rd floor just few floors above kingdomcom
You remember Cary Grant in the “Affair to Remember” of course when he asked Deborah Kerr “How about the top of the Empire State Building?” to which she answered “Oh yes, it’s the closest thing to heaven we have in New York…” Well that’s the 102nd floor they were talking about and mine isn’t even half of it, but I still have to climb that many floors to get to where and to meet who?
Forget it, what was I thinking? So I looked out my picture window and wonder what goes behind those lighted windows in clusters of high rise buildings that could very well equal the height of Empire State Building, that is if I were to arrange them like building blocks – one on top of the other which should take all my supply of glue sticks, so forget that too and I wasn’t really thinking.
I open the window and choke on the evening’s smog and hear Antony’s “I made these wars for Egypt and the Queen whose heart I thought I had for she had mine, which whilst mine had annexed unto’t a million more…nay weep not gentle Eros. There is left us, ourselves to end ourselves.” Yeah right.
The smog froze in my face midway between giddy nostrils and weepy eyes so I closed my window. Forget the mnemonics in ellipsis here. Out there from the same window, is a good view of the corporate metropolis ready to party but it is a long way down you know, make that 79 floors less the Empire State Building. What was it I was trying to forget?
I am googling my favorite search engine typing in names of great thinkers and great writers ensconced in the penthouse of the great kingdom above. I am hoping to jettison from the roof of my building to gate crash on their mad tea party. Easier said than done.
It has been years and counting since my last attempt and now that I am more adept with my computer and more chronologically gifted with biological clock ticking, I have decided to turn my attention to cooking. The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach, yes but do these great ghosts eat? Fat chance but let me die trying. When I do, I expect to find myself in their company wondering if I put too much cheese in my ravioli.
Those I leave behind in and outside of my building who believe in anthropomorphic God may be relieved to know that He too has a sense of humor. One ought to see the company He keeps.
Back to earth and in the 23rd floor of my building, I wonder if the tower of Babel began the need for Empire State buildings. If heaven was within a hundred and seven floor reach would I still be here quoting lines instead of rubbing elbows with my favorite Saints?
On second thought and many years thereafter, I find talking to my cat suffices until the saints come marching in again and I should be following close behind.
