Falling Through

A few years ago, I was hanging out on a rooftop.

This seemed pretty cool.
Actually, it was very cool.

A rooftop in the city
End of summer
Staring out in the future, or past, or whatever

It was very CW
Like, an indie band was playing in my head
And it was one of those moments you want to take a snapshot of
Because you think--Yeah, this is my awesome tv moment

There was, however, one thing missing

Paper lanterns

A rooftop is not complete without paper lanterns
Mainly because
Without them
It's pitch black
And you're liable to fall to your death

Which almost happened...I think.

Let me explain:

I was walking from one end of the roof to the other
And I didn't notice the giant gap in the middle of the roof
That would send a person two stories down
To either hideous injury
Or just, you know, death

I remember stepping forward
And then back
And when I stepped back
The person I was on the roof with said 'Careful'
And moved their flashlight over the gap

I looked down into, well, just darkness
But a LOT of darkness

'Oh my God,' I said

Not because I just almost died
But because I could have sworn that I really had stepped forward
Onto what appeared to be nothing
Meaning I should already be lying two stories down
Broken or dead

But I wasn't

Now, to be clear, I didn't have a 'Life flashing before my eyes' near-death experience
Because I didn't know I was near-death until the experience was already over

What I will say is that the night continued
And I felt revved up
Like I had cheated death
But I also felt like...

Like I had gone down a road now

Like Robert Frost was totally onto something--

(Because up to that point, I thought he was just a hack)

--And you really do come to two roads

Although one road is death
And the other is not death

And I went down 'Not Death'
Which is a super nice road
Even if it does have a few potholes in it

I imagine death is probably a very nice road
Very smooth
Because, you know, it's death

But even while on 'Not Death'
I thought to myself--

Am I sure I'm not dead?

Because what if Death just seems like your life continuing?

What if you're in a car
And the car goes towards a tree
And then the next thing you know
There's no tree in sight
And you're just driving along on a highway
And everything's fine?

Because, wouldn't that really be most people's choice for a Heaven?
A place where you can go on pretending that you're still alive
Even when you're not?

I always thought that no matter how nice Heaven is
I'm still going to be pissed when I get there that I'm not alive
(You know, assuming I'm actually heading there
I'm an atheist so most of this is a weird sort of rambling anyway)

Ever since that night on the roof
Anytime something good has happened to me
I've wondered if life really ended that night on the roof
And the good stuff is just the creation of my post-life mind
Trying to make me happy
Without tipping me off that I'm no longer among the living

Conversely, whenever something bad happens
I find that I can sort of take it in stride
Because, Hey, I might actually be dead anyway
So who cares?

I hate to make it sound like I advocate for having a near-death experience
But I don't exactly not advocate for it

I think it's, you know, nice work if you can get it
Provided you get "near" but don't actually
You know, die

It's sort of nice to have the marker

That night on the roof
Might have been it

And you know what?

There are worse ways to go