My next life

[Busby]

It's the second day of 2020 and this year I will be 82 years of age - something I didn't expect to happen. This means of course that the train I'm on is slowly chugging into the terminus. I don't know if, after stepping out onto the platform, I'll be going on by bus, taxi, tube or bike, or maybe just disappear into thin air as if in an Agatha Christie novel.

But I'm starting to prepare, that is I'm making a list of where and what and how I don't want to be the next time round. According to 'The Tibetan Book of the Dead' I'll need to be very careful for the following 49 days after stepping onto the platform so to clarify the situation my ponderings have led me to the following conclusions. All of which by the way are based upon the information I have from the media in general, from newspapers, documentaries, television, radio and the like.

I certainly don't want to be re-born as a member of a reindeer-herding family in Siberia, Lapland or Canada.
Nor as a member of a pygmy tribe in the jungles of Borneo.
Nor do I want to be born in North Korea.
I'd prefer not to be re-born in Africa so that cuts out a lot of those horrible north African countries and also avoids starvation and persecution.
Nor do I see myself in Asia, with millions of people all looking over my shoulder, but at a pinch,yes.

Nor do I want to be a homosexual, nor a cripple, not a religious fanatic and I don't want to be chubby. I'd also like to avoid being anything other than human - so not a dog please, not a cat and so on - although I have nothing against a short period as say an eagle.

Having once again busied myself with Swedenborg I also have to add that I don't want to be re-born on another planet or in another galaxy, I know the choice is enormous but I've always been quite happy where I now am. It could be that life on another planet, one where one is pure slime for instance and oxygen is unknown would lead me to higher things - but I'm not ready for that yet.

There is a new couple who have moved in next door, still young and full of energy. I wonder if there is a possibility there? She is really beautiful and he is extremely handsome, so any offspring would be almost certain of a good start. Trouble is they have two big dogs and I'm frightened of dogs, so no, I have to be careful.

So that, more or less, is what I don't want. There are of course a few borderline cases; as a Finn I'd be stuck in darkness 6 months of the year, as a Peruvian (which could be very interesting) I wouldn't want to be a woman as I'd have to wear one of those silly looking skirts, nor would I want to be a Texan - simply because of those stetson things. And so on.

I'll have to ponder some more and think about what and who I'd like to be. Actually I'd prefer to start again where I am at the moment, but I would have to be very lucky.