heavenly stuff

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For playful purposes:

Heaven is a time and place without excuses. There is the question of whether a time a place would be possible if there were no excuses, but let's set that aside.

A time and place without excuses.

Excuses are explanations with a self-serving twist. They are so common and so various in their incarnations that it's probably best to write them off with a shrug and a bit of what-sounds-like-benevolent murmuring: "It's only human after all..." a pretty good excuse.

Some excuses are acceptable. Some are hugely ornate. Some are twisted bits of horror. Some are minor bits of humor: "The dog ate my homework." Some excuses create warming nests (the 'human' bit) and some do not. Some excuses get a bad rap. Others do not.

But what crossed my mind this morning was the heavenly moments people actually experience -- the times without any excuse whatsoever ... and how delicious and encouraging and gimme-more-of-that they can be. The time and place where excuses cannot enter.

It's the stuff that, if only for a nanosecond, can blow fresh air into a stale life. A sunset, perhaps. Or a piece of music. Or a kiss. Or a deer outlined at the top of the knoll. Or (if you're inclined as I am) a single spoonful of good chocolate mousse. What a relief, what a lightening of the load, what a clear and unalloyed truth. No more excuses: This ... is ... it -- right up until the moment you say so.

Is it possible that these nanoseconds or perhaps a few minutes of living without excuses are so magnetic, so convincing, that they inspire people to do things like create religion? What a blessing not to have to carry this weight. "Is" just is and it's as obvious as blue sky. It is not something to "share," it is just something that is shared: A life without excuses.

It's not anything extraordinary. In fact it's just too ordinary. Sometimes horrific. Sometimes blissful ... the heaven for which there is no excuse... simultaneously elusive and inescapable ... a time and place without excuses. Heavenly.
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