Eulogy

The priest addresses the church, filled to the brim with everyone I've ever known. All have their attentions directed utterly to the podium.

"WELCOME, ONE AND ALL, KITH AND KIN, TO THE FUNERAL OF ALEX DEWEY."

The crowd is silent.

"IN THE COURSE OF HIS LIFE, I SAY UNTO YOU, ALEX'S BLOGS AND SONGS APPEARED TO ALL OF US AT SOME POINT, PERHAPS IN A SURREPTITIOUS "REPLY TO ALL" OR A HAND-DELIVERED, FRAMED POSTER-SIZED VERSION OF ONE OF HIS BLOGS."

The crowd is silent, though a general nodding sweeps the stage.

"ALSO DON'T FEEL GUILTY IF YOU DIDN'T GET THROUGH THEM, ALEX TOLD ME JUST BEFORE HE DIED THAT WAS ALRIGHT. HIS LAST WORDS. LET'S GIVE HIM A HAND!"

The crowd roars with approval.

"SOME OF THOSE SONGS AND BLOGS WERE CRAP, WEREN'T THEY. WHAT ALEX TOLD ME IS IT WAS LIKE PART OF A PROCESS, AND IF IT DIDN'T GO WELL SOMETIMES, WELL, THAT'S THE PRICE TO BE PAID, AND HE HOPES YOU ENJOYED WHAT YOU READ."

The crowd continues to cheer.

"BUT NOW, OF COURSE, ALEX IS DEAD."

The crowd is silent again.

"ALEX IS BATHED IN LIGHT, NOW, ALEX IS WANDERED TO THE GREAT BEYONDERED. HE IS DEAD, BUT ALIVE, IN ANOTHER SENSE." The priest is visibly pleased with his own wordplay, unaware that "beyondered" is only a word in a better world than this. The priest raises his shoulders with confidence now, though. "ALEX IS ALIVE IN ALL OUR HEARTS, IN ALL THE SPRIGHTLY AND AWKWARD AFFECTS OF THE YOUNGER GENERATION. YOU CAN SEE A CHILD STUMBLE AND SMILE ABOUT IT AND REMEMBER WHAT IT WAS LIKE TO HAVE HIM."

The crowd cheers. A child falls over, seemingly from the sheer unendurable ennui of having to listen to eulogies for someone's child he never knew. He also appears to forget how to stand. He is that clumsy. The crowd laughs affectionately, remembering the departed.

"AND IN THE END THAT'S WHAT MATTERS, THAT WE HAVE SOMETHING TO HOLD ON TO. BUT ALEX HAD DOUBTS, MY FRIENDS, ALEX HAD DOUBTS."

"What about? WHAT ABOUT DEWEY'S DOUBTS, PREACH?" one of my drunk friends asks.

"ALEX DOUBTED THAT HE WOULD GET TO HEAVEN, MY YOUNG FRIEND. HE DOUBTED HE WOULD GET TO WALK IN THE PATH OF THE LORD. AND HE DOUBTED THAT HE HAD DONE RIGHT WITH HIS ART, MY FRIENDS."

The crowd gasps. Self-doubt from this gregarious titan of artistic industry? Unimaginable!

"DOUBTFUL, ALEX SAID IT WAS TOO METATEXTUAL, THAT THE METATEXTUAL ELEMENTS OVERWHELMED THE TEXTUAL ELEMENTS! HE SAID IT WASN'T GOOD ENOUGH TO SHOW THE CROWDS IT NOW ADORNS. HE SAID THAT HE JUST NEEDED TO STOP TALKING ABOUT TALKING AND START TALKING ABOUT THE WORLD ITSELF."

The crowd boos my doubts.

"BUT I SAY UNTO YOU THAT ALEX IS BATHED IN LIGHT NOW AND, THOUGH BESET BY SIN AND DOUBT, SPOKE ONLY FROM A PLACE OF TRUTH, FROM HIS EARLIEST, FORLORN EXPERIMENTS. I SAY UNTO THEE, MY FRIENDS, THAT ALEX WAS NEVER TOO METATEXTUAL AND HE WAS NEVER TOO TEXTUAL. HE WAS ALWAYS JUST METATEXTUAL ENOUGH. IN THE WORDS OF THE BOBBY TROUP STANDARD HE WAS SO FOND OF... "HIS HEART WAS... FULL OF SPRING" REJOICE AT THE FALLEN, MY FRIENDS!"

Big cheer for this. The priest wraps up.

"Thank you all for coming out. There is food and refreshments at the back. Eat, drink, and be merry. Oh, and one more thing... he didn't die."

Audible gasps.

"In fact, he's right here." A spotlight shines on the very center, front row of the church. I go up to the podium, wearing a huge grin. I speak directly into the mic, obviated the need for shouting. I speak with perfect calm. Everyone is happy.

"I didn't die, after all." I put some shades on just as the spotlight hits me, I reflect light, for a moment, like the sun and begin to rap. "YO I BROUGHT ALL YOU HERE SO YOU COULD HEAR MY RAP. I'VE BEEN WORKING ON MY FLOW, JUST THOUGHT THAT YOU SHOULD KNOW, I'M NOT ONE AND DONE IN THIS LAND OF ENDLESS SUN. I COULDN'T HAVE DIED JUST TRY TO THROW THE SHADE... ON A MAN THAT DOESN'T HIDE, YO I GOT IT MADE. IT'S ALL THANKS TO YOU... SUPPORT THAT HELPED MAKE THE GRADE... YOU READ MY STUFF WHEN I WAS LITTLE... NOW I'M IN THE WALL STREET JOURNAL... OF HIP-HOP. PEACE..."

The crowd is totally silent. No one knows what to say. Except me.

I drop the microphone and it falls into the center of the Earth. I'm cold like that, and no obstacle prevents the mic from reaching its destination. No one can say anything to that.

The End

Epilogue: The act was a tremendous success. Owing to a couple producers I'd invited less-than-scrupulously, the priest and I now embark upon a 67-funeral tour spanning three months. 

On Consciously Rejecting Paranoia and Its Safety Net

"Has he simply run out of things to say?" the malicious voice inside Alex Dewey asks, knowing the effect it will have on him.

"Has he simply run out of things to say?" the paranoid voice repeats, revealing in its pathetic refrain the banality of the supposition to him.

When your paranoid voice speaks to you and it's talking about whether that vagrant is positioning himself near you to mug you? You listen - it's a voice possessed of bigotry and instincts, after all, but sometimes that's the only thing that matters.

But when you're paranoid about big-picture stuff, like conspiracies, impossible surveillance, gigantic state secrets without a rational reason to exist? Then you hear it, stop in your tracks, and you walk in the opposite direction. When your paranoid voice is lecturing you about the meaning of life, you silence it like the zealot it is. And almost as soon as you make this commitment to silence the paranoia and see the good in a person or a situation, it's like watching a flash flood as the self-deceptions erode and what you are left with may be unpleasant, but closer to truth than when you started.