I’ve been out of it lately, for stupid reasons that I ought to be handling better. I’m just so tired. My life has been in a state of uncertain flux for too long, and I’ve gotten way off-balance.
As I was browsing some unfamiliar blogs (great for when you’re tired but paradoxically have insomnia) this insightful post at Old English in New York grabbed me. It revisits that late-night dorm-room question: if you could live forever, would you choose to do so? Reflecting on her answer, MKH turns to the wisdom of Dr. Who.
That’s right, Dr. Who. Then The Wanderer, which always reminds me of Tolkien:
- How that time has passed away,
- dark under the cover of night,
- as if it had never been!
The comments further invoke the X-Files and Chaucer’s “Pardoner’s Tale.” I saw Highlander in there somewhere, too. And the Fall. And Rilke. Oh, what a grand and rambling tour.
MKH’s conclusion:
Maybe we’re just hardwired genetically to reject our mortality, to strive to live beyond it no matter the cost — but there’s another side to that struggle that seems to recognize that, were it different, we would — whether in one thousand years or one billion — get tired.
Tired. I know that feeling, and I haven’t finished this life.
Yet ironically, nothing perks me up like a Dr.Who-Chaucer-X-Files mashup. So now, after soberly contemplating the entropic destruction of all I know and love, I feel much better!
And although I’d still take a bye on immortality, I could see how it might be tolerable – if one is guaranteed a very large library, and an eclectic circle of immortal friends who can, as Harriet once put it to Lord Peter Wimsey, “talk piffle.” That might be worth it.
Yes, as Woody Allen puts it, eternity is really long, especially near the end.
But with immortal pals … that could make a difference indeed.
And please, let’s none of us be over 30. I was especially partial to 27, myself. I must say, though– earthly immortality seems even less conceivable and desirable when one has children. Children just don’t fit into that deliciously ideal picture of reading good books and talking piffle, and I certainly don’t want to be washing diapers for eternity. But it would be too weird if my offspring paused to be immortal at 30, too– or passed on immortality altogether.
Pierre – I can’t say I’d pick Woody Allen for my personal immortal book club, but he does have a point.
mdvlist – shhhh; we are still, and indefinitely, 27. Right?? (Don’t disagree with me; I’m older than you).
None of us over 30 ? There is something of Logan’s Run about that, no ? But I guess anyone below 30 would not remember Logan’s Run, would they ?
Logan’s Run is CLASSIC! But the film is slightly older than I am. By a month or two (I’ll take what I can get.)