What Happens After You Die?

Please forgive the late posting. Massive LANning has postponed normal processes such as blogging and processing non-carbonated beverages. I'll have another post up soon to get back on track.

I was at the DMV the other day with the mom, and she gave me shit for being an organ donor. My initial response was "Who fucking cares! I'm fuckin dead, take what you need. It's a going out of business liquidation sale!" But, as always, that inconsequential event got me thinking, which got me overthinking, which led me to a general conclusion about the human condition, reaffirming my rule of thumb that people are full of shit.

So what do you believe happens after you die? The answer to this question, for most people, lies along two possible axes:

The physical - "I want to be buried/embalmed/mummified/cremated/worshipped annually at my sacrificial altar." These answers concern how people want their remains handled after they die.

The spiritual - "Since I'm such a fucking dandy person, I'm going to heaven/Valhalla/be reincarnated as good looking/be one with the Magical Corn Cob of the Universe." These answers concern what happens to one's "soul" or whatevs.

Anyway, the main theme weaving through these answers is that, even in death and beyond, humans are selfish, arbitrary folks full of bullshit. I just don't get these answers, after some time for thought. That's often the problem I have with customs or phrases or ideas - I'm not necessarily opposed to them, I just don't understand why they're held. If someone could elucidate the logic and reasoning behind otherwise bullshitty ideas, I would be much more accomodating (see Facebook note re: bebbe names, particularly last names).

I'm not going to address the afterlife concept here, a concept of which I'm very critical for all sorts of reasons. That's another blog post. But the physical thing: Isn't it kind of conceited to decide what happens to your body after you die, when you didn't really own it in the first place? Carlin was right: life doesn't begin at conception, it began about 3.9 billion years ago, and it's been recycled ever since then. You are made of borrowed carbon atoms my friend, and the Earth was nice enough to loan them to you at no interest; just send it back to Her when you're done. But nopes! You want to be cremated! What a fuckin thought.

So you're borrowing your body, which we'll compare to borrowing a house. While you're living in this other person's house, you fuckin trash the place - abusing your body by drinking, smoking, eating junk food, and listening to talk radio. THEN, when you're done dicking around with the place, you turn to the owner and say, "Welp, I guess I'm done with your house now. When I leave, I'd like you to burn your house down please. Those are my final wishes."

Also, reconsider the classic proverb: You wouldn't build a temple around a pile of dog shit. It might not exactly be a proveb. I might've made it up right now. But the point stands - why all the pomp and circumbullshit around what happens to your body, when it is, effectively, a very large bag of fertilizer at this point?

Consider the fact that some people want their bag of fertilizer to be cleaned. And then dressed in their best clothes. And then a gathering held, complete with speeches, to celebrate the fact that we're all just gonna conveniently forget the bad things the bag of fertilizer did when it was alive. And then the fertilizer will be placed in a magnificent, polished, goose down lined oak box with chrome handles. This boxed fertilizer will then get its very own space in the ground, and that ground will never, ever be used for anything else - overpopulation and homeless folk be damned. Once a year, the mourning family has to visit the bag of fertilizer's spot in the ground, and place dying plants on it. How will they find that particular bag of fertilizer among all the others? A tombstone - a permanent landmark that details most of information available on the bag of fertilizer's driver's license. And some fertilizers don't stop there! They get giant fucking tombstones - the ones with life-sized angels playing trumpets and throwing flowers and shit. And there will be many of these tombstones, each of them marking their bags of fertilizer, forming a sort of very somber miniature golf course.

So what happens after you die? Your ideas live on, if your life was worth a damn in the first place.