Bitty Eschatology

The Anarchist thinks deep thoughts about
the afterlife...and flatulence. 

About a week ago, my silly, noisy, irreverent Anarchist started doing something really creepy. A few times a day she would walk up to me, plant herself dead in front of me, look gravely into my eyes and, with the voice of a kid straight out of a horror movie, announce, "You're going to die soon." And then she'd skip off to play "farting kitties" or whatever variation of potty-humor-related domestic animal game she was into at the moment. This is also the kid that wakes up from dreams with this ghostly look in her eyes and asks if her kindergarten teacher has broken her leg yet because "she's going to," or asks if the neighbor's house has burnt down yet or if "that happened in the dream first and is not going to happen quite yet in real life." Anarchist, darling, you're freaking Mommy out. Seriously. I'm half expecting the moss-laden demon nymph thing from that Mama movie to come leaping through my window in the middle of the night as the Anarchist stands there whispering "Mama!" in her creepiest voice.

Two days ago, the Anarchist came home and immediately started asking deep, imploring questions over her dinner of McNuggets and chocolate milk. Keeping with her recent "creepy" motif, she started asking about death. "Where do we go when we die? Do I get a new body? Will the world break to pieces?" And perhaps more ominously, "Mama, when you die really soon will Grandma be my new mom?"

We had a big long discussion about the varying eschatologies of the world's religious/cultural groups. The Dictator and I discussed moments of transcendence as evidence of "something more." The Anarchist stated her preference for either resurrection into a body like she had when she was a baby "only smarter, though" OR reincarnation, "but not as a ladybug." I put forth a thesis on why I was really quite unlikely to die soon. I convinced no one. I carefully explained that while I wasn't completely sure what it was like to be dead, I had several experiences in life that caused me to believe that there was something more and that it was good. I partially convinced some people (the Fat Assassin had that knowing look in her green glowing eyes that told me that she, at least, found my argument viable). The Dictator expressed her discomfort with this line of conversation and asked to change the subject. The Anarchist promptly changed the subject to Farts. Theology and bodily functions. The divine and the body. The Anarchist can make anything sound profound, dramatic and far-reaching...even farts.

And then yesterday the Anarchist came to me with a terrified look on her tiny face (and she can really contort her face into some pretty dramatic expressions...she's been practicing in front of the mirror for years). "Mommy, I'm really scared of all the devins! They are going to take me when I die and they are going to kill me and hurt me to death!" After a few guesses, I realized that she was talking about "devils" (plural devils, I guess...maybe with pitchforks and pointy tails and red pajamas). Apparently, her schoolmates at her newly assigned table had spent a great deal of time discussing demons and had scared the everliving daylights out of the Anarchist. Sounds like someone is reading Dante's Inferno as a bedtime story. Nice. I decided NOT to discuss the medieval concepts of hell with my kindergartener. I also decided against arguing that, rationally speaking, since she would already be dead, the "devins" would not be able to kill her again. I figured this line of reasoning would probably not be as comforting as just holding her and telling her that the kids in her class were "full of it" and that she should never, ever listen to other five-year-olds because five-year-olds tend to say/do creepy things...like talk ominously about death using their creepiest creepy voices...mostly just for dramatic effect...I hope.

I really hope. Because I swear to you, if I find that maternal demon nymph thing from the Mama movie climbing around my kitchen while the Anarchist uses her whispery voice to whisper freaky things at me, I will seriously die of fright. And I am in no mood to deal with all those pitchfork-wielding devins in the afterlife.