In the year 2525, I’ll still be paying off that student loan

Far as I know, history has recorded only one occurrence of someone coming back from the dead and that was over 2,000 years ago. Still, I’m hopeful.

No, I haven’t suddenly gotten more religion than I had yesterday. And I haven’t begun living my life in a manner that would assure I’m assigned to better (and hopefully, cooler) quarters in the afterlife.

I’m talking about living longer in this life. My current body ain’t much, but for the moment, it’s all I’ve got. I’d like to keep it up and running as long as possible. Sadly, present day medical science can only do so much to facilitate that goal.

In short: I’m going to die. Not today. Probably not tomorrow and hopefully not for 30 years or more. I’m actually shooting for 40, but I don’t want to get greedy.

No, wait a minute; yes, I do want to get greedy. I want to get greedy indeedy! I want to live to see that first Martian colony take hold, to see the shocked faces of the staid naysayers when someone finally invents warp drive. I want to see those far-off Utopias dreamt of by H.G. Wells and Thomas More.

I want to live long enough to pay off my student loan.

Until last Friday, I didn’t think I’d have that chance. Now? I’m not so sure.

As with so many pivotal moments in my life, this one occurred at a party. My daughter’s house in Detroit. Bonfire. No shortage of wine, Aubreii’s excellent homemade chili, pizza, and conversation with some of that city’s finest intellects. (At least they seemed that way after a few glasses of Pinot Noir.)

I was introduced to Joseph Kowalsky, director of the Cryonics Institute, in Clinton Township. The mission of the Cryonic Institute – cribbed from their website – is this: “To extend human lifespans by preserving the body using existing cryogenic technologies.”

This isn’t science fiction, folks. This is happening today.

Despite having limited brainpower myself, I do subscribe to a couple science journals, so I was already somewhat familiar with cryogenics. It works like this: when you die, your body is preserved through cryogenic techniques and flash frozen like a TV dinner. I’m guessing it’s slightly more technical in practice.

Point is, you are then stored cryogenically until such time as medical science comes up with a way to revive your corpse-sickle and bring you back to full health.

The cost for this procedure, I learned from Joe, is surprisingly affordable, especially if you plan ahead and pay for it with a life insurance policy. (Which, I’ll admit, appears to have some legal ramifications. I mean, if you’re brought back to life, are you required to repay the life insurance? It could get confusing, but at least you’d be alive to deal with it.)

I really want to do this. But I’ll admit I have a few concerns:

·         First off, I don’t want anyone putting funny hats on my frozen body and snapping selfies with me at Cryonics Institute Christmas parties.

·         What if I’m brought back 1,000 years from now only to serve as a wriggling entrée for humanity’s new, insectoid overlords?

·         I can barely figure out how to program my present-day Tivo system. I can’t imagine how convoluted that task will be in the year 2525.

·         If I don’t pay off that student loan before I go into frozen storage, the late charges accumulated over a few centuries are gonna kill me all over again!

·         What guarantee do I have that someone won’t trip over the plug to the freezer? I don’t want to wake up, still dead, in a puddle of lukewarm water.

But like I said, despite these concerns I’m going to take the plunge. I figure, what have I got to lose? A few bucks spread out over however many years I have left? The chance of winding up as an alien overlord’s menu option?

It’s worth the risk.

So, adieu, suckers! I’ll say hello to your great-grandkids on Mars.

mtaylor325@gmail.com

(616) 730-1414

How do you say goodbye to the woman who gave you life?

My mother died.

Those are the three hardest words I’ve ever written. She suffered from Alzheimer’s the past several years and we all knew this was coming. But somehow, despite all those months of preparation, I still wasn’t ready when my sister Carol phoned yesterday with the news.

In her life, my mother was a homemaker, a business owner, a telephone operator, a computer programmer, a student, a dancer, and a hair stylist. But if you asked her what she “did,” she would say she was a mom.

For her, that was the job that mattered.

When she was young, my mother had potential; she was intelligent, beautiful, witty, talented. She had it all. And then she had me.

From that point on all her hopes, dreams and aspirations took a back seat to my needs and my wants. Two more boys and two girls followed in quick succession, and her love and protection encompassed each of them in turn, like a goose down comforter.

My mom always saw the best in her children, though that must sometimes have been hard, at least in my case. No accomplishment, however insignificant, escaped my mother’s notice. No failure was beyond redemption.

She was proud if I brought home an A. Or a B, or a C. She would have been proud had I brought home a note from the principal saying I’d been suspended for carrying a knife to class. (Which actually happened once, in seventh grade. It was a linoleum cutter; I’d been helping my dad with a project that morning before school and had stuck it in my pocket without thinking when the bus arrived.)

At any rate, my mom loved us no matter how badly we screwed up. For the life of me, I can’t remember her ever saying anything bad about me or my siblings, even when there were plenty of bad things just begging to be said.

In the year or two before her Alzheimer’s stole away the last of her, I called her almost daily, just to check in. By then, she was easily confused, had a hard time finding the words she wanted to say. It frustrated her greatly, but she faced her pitiless decline the way she faced every adversity life threw her way: with a sense of humor.

Even as her mind slipped away a piece at a time, she never stopped loving life, never stopped being proud of the children she had brought into this world.

One day before things got too bad we were conversing on the phone and—as she so often did—she shifted the subject to her kids.

“Your brother is doing so well,” she said. “He’s writing for the papers now and working on a book. Michael’s really making something of himself. He’s such a hard worker.”

“Mom, I’m Michael,” I said. “You’re talking to Michael.”

There was a beat while she sorted this out.

“Oh,” she said. Then: “Your brother William has a new nursing position. He’s supervisor of his whole floor and Julie’s managing a blood bank. How’s the book coming?”

“It’s coming,” I said. That’s what I always said. Five years later, it’s still coming, because writing a book is hard work and I’m not a hard worker, despite what my mom thought.

But if I ever do finish it and see it published, I know whose name will appear on the dedication page. Even if the book sells a million copies and my mother’s name is read by a million readers, it won’t be enough.

The hard truth is, no matter what I do, it will never be enough to thank the woman who gave me life.

I miss you mom.

More “Reality Check” online at http://mtrealitycheck.blogspot.com or www.milive.com. E-mail Mike Taylor at mtaylor325@gmail.com

I may not look great now, but just wait until I die!

It was bound to happen; inevitable, really. In our appearance-obsessed culture, where it really is considered better to “look good than feel good,” how could it not?

I’m talking about – brace yourself – plastic surgery for the dead. Yup. You read that right.

I suppose in some ways this is just a natural extension of the mortician’s art. For years, undertakers have done their best to make old Aunt Hattie look “lifelike” for the wake. Makeup, hairdos and toxic chemicals have all been employed to give the dearly departed a healthy glow he or she probably never had in life.

We’ve come a long way from the days of putting a couple pennies over the eyes and calling it good. Today’s funerals are a multi-million dollar business. Not since the ancient Egyptians has a culture been so obsessed with putting a pretty face on that final ferry ride with Charon down the river Styx. (Which is actually a Greek reference, not Egyptian, I know. Just roll with me here, professor.)

Anyway, while we haven’t yet revived mummification, we are following a similar, though more modern route to the same end; namely, trying to look our best while moving from this world to the next.

Two of the services being offered by post-mortem plastic surgeons are lip plumping and breast augmentation. I know, I know, I couldn’t believe it either.

Plain Janes who somehow managed to get through decades of life looking the way God and nature intended can now enter the afterlife with Calista Flockhart lips and Dolly Parton ta-tas.

And it’s not just for the ladies. Guys, too, are opting for afterlife wrinkle reduction surgery, hair coloring and pec implants.

With regard to those implants it’s important to note – if you’re planning on cremation – they have a tendency to explode when heated. You may want to arrange to have them removed first, unless of course you want to go out with a bang.

Naturally, all this stuff costs a whole lot more than a couple pennies on the eyes, but just think how jealous all those wrinkly, thin-lipped, small-ta-ta’ed living people left behind will be!

OK, does anyone besides me think this is nuts?

When I kick the bucket, I don’t care if the Lovely Mrs. Taylor stacks me in a corner, puts a rubber cigar in my mouth, a pinwheel beanie on my head and lets the cats use me as a jungle gym. (There’s actually a chance she will do just that.)

I won’t care. For once, it won’t matter how I look. In fact, I’m rewriting my will this afternoon. I’m leaving specific instructions for the undertaker to leave my shirt untucked, my hair uncombed, and my face unshaven.

I want to spend eternity in comfort. I’m hoping Heaven has no dress code. And if Heaven’s not to be my final destination, well, how I look will be the least of my worries.


Missed a week? More “Reality Check” online at http://mtrealitycheck.blogspot.com or www.milive.com. E-mail Mike Taylor at mtaylor325@gmail.com.

In a perfect world, our pets would outlive us

We just added another one to the Pet Cemetery. Our faithful pooch, Kipper, went this past weekend to the Big Fire Hydrant in the Sky. We held services out at the farm and laid Kipper to rest alongside his old pals Egypt, Speck, Vincent and the numerous bunnies, guinea pigs, parakeets and goldfish that have shared our home over the years.

Kipper was a great dog, one who had been with us a long time, and many tears were shed at his passing. He was a member of the family and will be missed.

The only critters still occupying the Taylor home are Stanley—Mrs. T’s Siamese cat—and two finches, Sid and Nancy. It seems mighty lonesome around here just now, but we’re going to try to get used to it rather than immediately restocking the menagerie.

It’s just too hard to say goodbye when our pets die, which they always do, eventually. Also—and I hesitate to say this with Kipper so recently in his grave—this is the first time in years I’ve able to walk across the back yard without keeping an eye out for “land mines.”

On top of that, Kipper was a one-dog defoliant. Wherever he lifted his leg, grass died. He was the furred equivalent of Agent Orange.

Over the years, we tried changing Kipper’s diet, feeding him doggie treats laced with charcoal, encouraging him to drink more water. Nothing worked. Whatever passed through him remained toxic to all growing things.

If I could figure out the exact chemical composition of Kipper’s whiz, I could make a fortune selling it to the military or Dow Chemical.

Next weekend, I plan to reseed the dozens of patches laid bare by Kipper’s frequent bathroom breaks. I don’t know if I can get grass to grow there again in my lifetime, but I intend to try.

I love having a dog around, but as I said, we’re going to try to remain canine-free, at least for a while. We may make it, we may not. It all depends on how successful we are in avoiding pet shops, humane societies, and front yard “pooch corrals” with signs saying “FREE PUPPIES!”

At the moment, The Lovely Mrs. Taylor is adamant: No More Dogs! The grief over losing Kipper is still too fresh; an experience she is understandably reluctant to repeat any time soon.

But I know her. Eventually—maybe sooner, maybe later—she will stumble across a bundle of fur with a broken leg, or big, sad eyes, and that’ll be that. We’ll be re-dogged.

I hope to be in my late 90s by the time that happens. Just once, I’d like to have a dog outlive me.
More “Reality Check” online at http://mtrealitycheck.blogspot.com or www.milive.com. E-mail Mike Taylor at mtaylor325@gmail.com.