A good friend (I’m going to refer to her as Lisa, but that’s not her name) called me today to point out something I had never considered, and she asked me to point it out to you.  I’m doing that now.

When Lisa tells someone that she has a terminal diagnosis, they ask the clinical questions: “How long do they think you have?  What can be done?  How are you feeling physically?”  What no one ever asks is, “Are you scared?”  That’s really the most important question. 

I am practically a Vulcan in my devotion to logic over emotion.  Logic is how problems are solved.  Logic is where we gain clarity about the world.  Logic allows us to examine possible choices and make the one most likely to grant us the outcome we want.  Logic is the basis of the science that I hope will save her life. 

We are, however, all human.  Humans do what we do for emotional reasons.  Emotion is at the core of our existence.  It’s why we get up in the morning.  There is some emotional need we must fill.  Logic is, as my favorite Vulcan reminds us, “the beginning of wisdom, not the end.”  It is a tool to help us; nothing more.  Emotion is our motivation.

Yes, my friend is scared.  Few of us can stare into the face of our own mortality without fear.  We are running out of time to do the things we still want to do.  When we’re gone from this life, we’re gone forever.  When we’ve been dead ten billion years, we will have been dead for only a tiny fraction of the time we’re going to be dead. 

I don’t know whether there’s an afterlife, but I’m sure we only get one life to be the person we are today.  There isn’t a second one unless there’s a Big Crunch that reverses the Big Bang, and we live backward in time.  Perhaps when we’re dead we’ll go to Heaven or (as some of my Christian friends fear) to Hell because we didn’t choose the right set of beliefs.  Perhaps we will be reincarnated as some of my other friends think, but if we are, we won’t be who we are now in the next life.  Perhaps our energy will simply rejoin the universe from whence it came.  It won’t be reorganized into the people we are now.    

Lisa is nearing the place she can pull her Social Security, and she intends to grab it all and go live while she can.  I completely support that choice.  When time is running out, make every day count.  There’s little to be gained by saving for a future that is unlikely to arrive.

And then I began to think a bit wider.  I love Lisa.  I had a schoolboy hormone-hazed crush on her 40 years ago.  In the interim, both of us have had rich, full lives in which our paths only rarely crossed.  I wonder sometimes if our lives would have been different had I found the courage to talk to her in high school.  It’s irrelevant, though.  I can’t change the past. 

I don’t know how much time she has left.  It’s not long enough.  At the same time, I don’t know how much time I have left, either.  I’m nearly 60, I’m a potentially brittle diabetic when my life goes South, I smoke too much (although I have managed to cut it back some), and I need both hands to stand up.  I would like to continue to exist for a while, but the odds are not good.  I’m learning from my friend.  I’m living the best I can while I can.  I have no plans for 30 years from now. 

I started by thinking about her.  I moved to thinking about me.  Then I thought about you.  I hope you have another century to go.  But… let’s take a look at the world for a moment. 

It’s hotter now than it has been in modern times.  It’s unlikely to get much cooler.    The extra heat requires extra air conditioning which adds extra stress to our planet.  Our water supply is running out.  Water is the basis of all life.  With no water, there can be no food.  Climate change is real, it’s nearing the point of no return (if it hasn’t already passed it), and we are, for the most part, just making it worse.  The planet isn’t going to support us for much longer.  The amount of money you have will be irrelevant.

The world is flirting with nuclear war.  We won’t recover from it if it happens.  You won’t be taking your money to the grocery store to get yourself a steak.  There won’t be either a grocery store or a steak to be found.  If you survive, it’s not going to resemble the life you’re enjoying today.

With each passing week, we move, in America at least, closer to an authoritarian dictatorship.  The division between our people is deeper than it has been since the Civil War.  There are more than a few people who believe a second one may come.  There are others who are hoping for one.  (I’m not among them.)

The time we have left to enjoy the lives we have is probably running out much more quickly than we would hope. 

On the other hand…

At this moment, which is the only one in which any of us can live, I’m doing fine.  My dog is sleeping on the couch, and he isn’t even eating it.  I have enough food for the next few days, and I have the means to get more if I run out.  I have plenty of Diet Pepsi and a wonderful bed in which to sleep.  My air conditioning is keeping me cool.  At this moment.

It’s my hope and assumption that you’re doing, at this moment, at least as well as I am.  This is the moment to enjoy.  Bad things may be coming.  They probably are.  While there may be some things we can do, worrying about them isn’t any of the helpful ones.  Ruining this moment with fear of an upcoming lousy moment doesn’t prevent the lousy moment from arriving.  I am simply denying myself of the chance to enjoy this one.  I would rather not. 

I would love to change the world.  That’s why I do this show.  I have no great or intricate plans to do that.  All I have are ideas.  Logistics are best left to experts.  I’m not one. 

What could we do?  We could unite behind a goal I think more than 90% of us share: let everyone their lives, their way, so long as they’re not hurting anyone.  If your way of life is being a serial killer, I will need to object.  If you’re different from me in some other way, I see no problem with that.  Why should anyone else?  Your sexuality might be different from mine.  That doesn’t hurt anyone else.  Your gender, your race, your age, your skin color, your country of origin, your body, and / or your soul are probably different from mine.  Neither of us chose that.  Why should we object to the differences?  Let everyone live their lives, their way.

The number of people who disagree is startling.  Our job is to change their minds.  There are those who want us to live in fear because it helps them.  Money allows them to create that fear.

Think of it like this.  If you had $100,000,000 in the bank right now, would you still go to work tomorrow? 

If you would, you have a job that you find satisfying and that you enjoy.  I’m ecstatic for you.  You’re spending your minutes in the way you want.  You’re living your best life.  Well done.

If you wouldn’t, you’re going to work tomorrow because you want to survive.  You’re scared of homelessness or hunger.  You’re scared of losing what you have earned so far. 

Fascists love fear.  I love hope. 

Fear will get you to do what you’re told.  If someone is holding a knife to your loved one’s throat, the odds that you will do what the criminal tells you to do increase exponentially. 

If we live in a world dominated by money, one in which without money we have nowhere to live, nothing to eat, little access to medical care, and we are living with the constant threat of imprisonment simply for existing somewhere without proper authorization, we live in fear.  Those with lots of money know this, and they use it to force us to do what they tell us, with the same power the knife wielding criminal has. 

My friend, fellow podcast host, (his show is called Interstellar Frequency, and if you want to his real name, you’ll have to listen to that.) and Person on The Porch, Miles O’Brien, told me this week that he was shocked to learn that the President of The United States receives a salary.  Why would a President need one?  What can he possibly want that he can’t get for free?  Money is freedom.  We evidently want the President to have more of it than he already has.

A group called Rage Against The Machine, to whom I rarely listen, made quite a bit of money in the 90s (I don’t know how much.  My Google search didn’t reveal that information.) with a song called “Killing in The Name” in which they repeated a famously unpleasant phrase followed by the words “I won’t do what you tell me” over and over.  It turns out people don’t like to be told what to do.  We want the freedom to choose for ourselves.  Why is that such a radical idea?

I’m choosing not to live in quite so much fear.  That’s bold talk, even from someone who’s not what Robert Duvall called “a one-eyed fat man.” I’m afraid to leave my own house.  I’m afraid of you.  Who am I to talk about living with less fear? 

I’m an old man with a nice dog and enough to eat, who is replacing their fear with my hope.  There is much to fear.  I’m just not dealing with it in every moment of my life.  I do what I can to fight for freedom and justice, and then I enjoy what I can of my life.  There’s nothing to fear in this moment, and this is the only one I’m certain I have.  When I run out of moments, I have no more chances for happiness.  I’m going to enjoy the ones I can.  I hope you will, too. 

If it helps, I’ll remind you once again… I love you.