I was in a strange house. Then I realized that this was Mrs. K.’s home. We had some business with each other for several years and we met regularly and worked together. She is now 88 years old and we said goodbye more or less about a year ago. The time came when she became a nursing case. I had indirectly often tried to speak to her on a rational level, so that she might interrupt her ceaseless programming to the extent that she would eventually become a nursing case. But she was a human, who doubted such things from the beginning, without ever having examined them. She did not believe in her own strength and the power of thoughts and feelings. Prejudices… like so many people have them. I could not convince them.
Now she has been a nursing case for a year and that was also a reason to stop our meetings. Now I was in her apartment. Her maid was just there and cleaned up. On the table stood a keyboard, which Frau K. bought several years ago to practice piano playing.
On the keyboard was a piece of paper on which the name of a friend stood. She wrote that she wanted to give her the keyboard because she no longer had the strength to play on it and is now a nursing case and will die soon. On another table, with silver legs and a genuine gilt-edged edge, stood her laptop. There was also a piece of paper with the name of another friend. She wanted to give her the laptop for the same reasons.
There were also other objects, that she wanted to give away. Lamps, cabinets, TV … A short time later the cleaning lady left. I stood next to Mrs. K. and looked at her again. She was wearing a white night shirt with blue flowers. In my perception, her white hair shone a little. She could not see me.
I was in an out-of-body condition and had just visited her to see how she was. It was clear. She made her last preparations to say good-bye to the world of the humans to go to another world. Of course, she firmly believes that after death there can be no more for her, but I will mischievously mingle into myself if she will be taught or experience otherwise.
“You know,” she said to me. “There are far too many logical reasons that there can be no life after death. First, we currently have about six billion people on our planet. Throughout the history of humanity, there must have been thousands of billions of people who have ever lived. Where are they all going? There can not be much space after death!”
“Perhaps there is much more space than here! You can not be sure about it”, I replied.
“So much space there? I do not believe that. All nonsense!”
“The universe is also huge and our planet Earth is only a tiny dust in space among all the other planetary planets and suns. There’s plenty of space.”
“And… what can I say to my husband? When he died, I married a new man a few years later. He is now already dead too, but how is that working? Am I together with both of them when I die? There are only problems! And all the people who have been killed, deceived, betrayed and hurt. What’s up with them? They will also be there and receive me? I do not know if I want that or for anyone else on this world. Not that I had done anything bad to anyone! I’ve always been true to people and have always liked to help, but I can not imagine how this is going to happen.”
“Maybe her two men are now good friends. Perhaps there are also other possibilities and laws there than here. There is simply no proof of absolute death and nothing comes after death. Just because you can not imagine something, it does not mean that it can not exist.”
“Yes, “she replied, “that is true, there is no proof, but there is no one that lives a life after death.”
” That is also true, but if there is no absolute proof, then everything that we think about the time after death, whether it be blackness and nothingness, or a paradise, a heaven, or even a different world, new laws and challenges, a prejudice.”
At this point, our conversation ended mostly. Her arguments were prejudices for me and mine were just prejudices for her.
A Pattenituation. But inwardly I grinned a little:
“You know,” she continued, “when I imagine how fast my life has passed. This is simply unbelievable. It was so fast. I would have liked to undo one or the other thing. I sometimes condemned a good friend and lost him. And now? Now I’m alone. And you know, I know I’ll die soon. It’s unclear whether I’ll be expecting the next Christmas, but I have to say I’m kind of scared right now.”
Now I stood invisible next to her and watched her as she made the final preparations. She probably felt very weak. Christmas had always been a fixed point for her. She thought, she was going to die this time. Maybe this Christmas is going to be so far. I’m curious about her surprised face…
