Hey you, Earthling!

Reading Advisory: All posts in this blog that are labeled as ‘Conversations with God’ are factual accounts of my dreams over the last few months. Dreams, as you know, have this ineffable ‘dream like’ quality and they cannot be blogged as such. So I have done a bit of spicing up to put them together in this blog. However every effort is taken to preserve the actual content and character of the conversation as it was privately revealed to me. I am not responsible for any ignorant bigotry that may arise out of stupidly accepting these dreams as reality.

“Hey you, Earthling”

I was startled to hear that deep, hoarse voice. It was little after midnight and I was sleeping alone in my room. Who the hell was that?

“Err…”

I hold sleeping as my inalienable birth right and detest violations of any sort. So I was irritated and let some expletives fly.

“Earthling, wake up”

I should confess that most of my school and college mates did not think much of my parent’s judgment on my name. Consequently I had quite a few nick names at school and college. But I was never called an Earthling. Who on the Earth would call another person an Earthling? I sort of felt insignificant.

“Yeah… who?” I asked.

“God” said the voice.

“Which God?” I asked again.

“There is only one God, you pig head”

I opened my eyes and I can swear on your life that I saw a pink apparition in my room. It was more like a sophisticated hologram. It was no way a humanoid and it lacked the basic symmetry you would expect out of an alien. Surprisingly, against all known laws of mechanics, it could balance itself. I suddenly became conscious that I was called a pig head.

“Hey, who the hell are you? I won’t fall for such third rate conjuror tricks”, I shouted. I didn’t let go of expletives this time, because I was scared to the deepest neurons of my brain.

“I am the God, the only one, the one who wrote the master algorithm for the make and maintenance of all universes” said the voice.

“Go away, God. I am an atheist. If anyone finds us together at this time of the day in my bedroom –”

“I know that, you big mouth”, the voice said angrily, “You blather your atheistic nonsense to every innocent life form you come across”.

“Do you eavesdrop...?"

"Uh" said the voice.

"God, I have never called you and I can deal with my life without you. Go away now!” I was stubborn.

“As if you will do something useful if I leave” the voice ridiculed, “I haven’t seen anyone playing halflife-2 third time in a row in this Milky Way”.

“Hey, that’s no business of yours. You are no more than a spam here, a spam in the inbox of an email account used only for downloading Thamizh MP3s; that much irrelevant and insignificant to me”, I said.

“Listen Monkey boy, I know I have woken you up. But, if you know where I am coming from, you wouldn't expect me to land here on a sunny Sunday morning” said the voice.

“I don’t really care. I know a born again girl in Chennai; I can give you her mobile number, if you really want to rant it out to someone” I persisted.

“What do you mean by born again? My algorithm for all carbonaceous life forms has single instantiation and single termination. In fact, I remember setting the rollback to no after termination” said the voice.

“Look, I have no time for your software show offs. We do that all the time at work. Now, tell me why you are bothering me?”

The apparition looked at me through all its thirteen light sensitive photocells and said “I am God”.

“Yeah, I heard that BS already”

“I can prove that”, the apparition said.

“Oh, Yeah. Come, part the water in the bathtub. We don’t fall for that anymore” I laughed.

“Ask me a question that no Ape in this planet has ever answered convincingly” the voice challenged.

The last known instance, when I had a predicament of this sort, was during an interview. The interview panel insisted on a question and when I blurted out, they weren’t sure whether I was really stupid or pretending to be stupid.

This time, I decided to ask the question that has been bothering me since my school days.

“What is the purpose of all these, life, death, war, disease, poverty, half life-2, this planet, mindless emptiness surrounding it, et al? What are we doing here all along? And why are we here in the first place?”

Apparition closed eleven of out of its thirteen light sensitive photocells. Other two light sensitive photocells were looking at the ceiling. I was wondering why the apparition is putting up a show for no reason.

“Do you know the answer?” I asked.

“Yes, hold on” it said.

I waited. The more I waited the more I was not getting an answer.

“Would it take some time? I mean... I got to go to work tomorrow” I said.

There was no response.

“Well…” I was about to say good night.

All of a sudden, all its closed light sensitive photocells opened up and I became their point of focus.

“You got the answer?” I was thrilled.

“Yes, I computed the answer”

“What is that?”

“Are you ready?”

“Yes, all my life…”

“The answer is…”

“Uh?”

“642.39”

I blinked. I gave a serious thought. I ran though my past archives. Then I looked right into its thirteen unblinking light sensitive photo cells and said,

“This answer is absurd. I am sure you realize that too. But your answer is no less absurd than the answers given by all those god men ever lived on this planet. In fact, they stooped so low in their attempt to explain things - which they themselves don’t know of - that I find your answer so honest, so meaningful and so short. I can consider your God claim now”

There was a twinkle in one of its thirteen light sensitive photocells.

“Go on” I said.

Conversation continues here.