Chapter 30: Outside Space And Time

Time had stopped. Or if it hadn’t stopped, it was irrelevant. He was in a safe place. It might be an imaginary place, but he imagined it was safe, and so it was safe. “Is that all I have to do?” he asked God. But God wasn’t there. For a moment he panicked. And then he reminded himself that he was in a safe place. That was all he had to do to feel safe. Just be there. He looked out at the universe around him. It was vast. It was beautiful. Dots of light arrayed against a deep, deep, deepest black background. Some dots were stars, their colors revealing their current stage in stellar evolution. A few, at the furthest rim perceivable using the sense that correlated to what he would have called vision, were Population III stars, predicted theoretically, but so far undiscovered by terrestrial astronomers. Closer in were star-forming galaxies, 13 bil­ lion years old, less than a billion years after the Big Bang. Still closer were the more than 80 bil­ lion galaxies with their 20 septillion stars in the part of the universe observable from his home planet. He was far away from his life’s turmoil, but still at the center at the universe. His perception was not limited by physical laws. He could see far beyond the comoving dis­ tance that limits perception to the region of space-time within which radiation, moving at the speed of light ever since the Big Bang, could have reached an observation point that had also been moving through an expanding universe since that same time-beginning event. He could see the universe in the large—superclusters, clusters, galaxies, stars systems, and in the small: the fast-moving streams of particles that radiated from hot bodies everywhere in the universe; the cooling matter of just-formed planetary bodies circling uncountably many stars; and on ever so many of those planets, life. Life! Life was scarce. Most of the universe was cold, and dark. Blackness was the rule; light was the exception. Freezing—near-absolute zero freezing—was the rule; warm was the exception. Empty was the rule; nonempty was the exception. Dead was the rule; alive was the exception. And alive was an extraordinary exception. When life appeared, it was unstoppable. Anyone who worries about mankind destroying life on this planet simply does not understand the nature of life. Once life appears it evolves. It will adapt to the most difficult conditions. On Earth, extremophiles live in the deep oceans near 400 degree hydrothermal vents at 300 atmospheres of pressure; they live in the frozen wastes of Ant­ arctica; at the top of the highest mountains; in hot springs; in asphalt lakes; at the bottom of the Dead Sea. On other planets life is even more diverse; some living things have even adapted to the cold, dark, airless, emptiness of space. The universe had been without beauty until consciousness evolved and consciousness as­ signed it beauty; it was meaningless until a consciousness had assigned it meaning; it was not enjoyable until a consciousness put joy into it. It took consciousness to en-joy it and later in-joy it. Self-Referential Metanovel Writing for Dmmies He could do that. Are the creatures on other planets also my family? He wondered. My body is made of star- stuff, he thought. Except for some hydrogen atoms all the other atoms in the universe were born in the bellies of stars. Everything on this planet is made of star-stuff, the result of an ongoing series of accidents and mistakes. We are all children of stars. He thought. That statement was more metaphorical than literal, but in the end wasn’t the whole idea of parenthood metaphorical? I am the child of stars, he thought. We all are. And stars are the offspring of the Big Bang. Our biological ancestors could not see their beauty nor could our stellar ancestors; only we who have become conscious can assign beauty to the universe, and share that beauty; and revel in that beauty. Decision. The key was decision. Beauty did not exist apart from consciousness; it existed only when a consciousness decided something had beauty. The difference between beauty and non-beauty, or between beauty and ugliness (a particular kind of non-beauty) was a decision— nothing more. And as beauty was a decision, so was enjoyment. Any consciousness could decide to enjoy any thing, or to enjoy no thing. He could enjoy what he decided to enjoy, or he could do what most people did: enjoy only that which other people had agreed was easy to enjoy. Agreeing was easy, but it still took a de­ cision. An easy decision, but easy only because of practice. “Is this a ball?” He heard his mother say to his infant self. “Baw!” he heard himself say. “Yes, it’s a ball!” She said and hugged him, as he practiced agreeing, a necessary first tool for survival as a human. Every human spent years practicing agreement, which made it easy for every human to agree with other humans on what was real, even when what they called real was imaginary. He’d been trained to make the Third Classic Blunder. Making decisions where there was neither agreement nor disagreement was harder, and making disagreeing decisions still harder, but they were hard only because of lack of practice. I can see this here and now, he thought, and wrote as he thought. I’ve seen this before. Not just when I edited the previous draft, or when I originally wrote it. I’ve been here before, and seen this before. My safe place. This clarity. Why can’t I see this all the time? Or at least when I need to? He knew that the change he was looking for was just a decision away. It was something that he’d told his daughters many times, and had told himself many times. Change is just a decision away. I just have to make the decision. Decide. Imagine. Practice. It gets clearer with every draft because every draft contains more decision, more imagination, and a lot more practice. Was it clear enough now? I can make the decisions that I want to. He thought. They are my decisions to make or un­ make as I choose. He imagined himself as a mistake, and smiled. He imagined himself connected to his family. Some of his relatives were struggling, but most were just working. All connected. He felt warm. Self-Referential Metanovel Writing for Dmmies He imagined himself at the center of the universe and felt the universe around him. It felt good. He was in many places at once. He was in a timeless moment viewing the universe. He was in his novel, also in that timeless moment. And he was at the keyboard of his computer, typing, and smiling. And he was almost ready for the next chapter. He decided and imagined that he knew what he needed to practice to face that worst re­ membered day. And then he knew he knew it. He decided and imagined that he had the time he needed to practice what he needed to prac­ tice to face that day. He took the time and practiced. And practiced. And practiced. It only took a short while in objective time, but it was all the time in the world, and all the time that he needed. After a while he felt ready. Now, he thought. Back to the Worst Day Of My Life. Self-Referential Metanovel Writing for D*mmies