Pine Nuts with McAvoy Layne: A transmigration of souls
Submitted by Jeff Munson on Mon, 11/15/2021 - 1:28pm
A friend of mine, and popular columnist, whose name shall be kept a secret to protect the innocent, but rhymes with Pat Hickey, asked me yesterday if I believed in a life beyond. I felt like Jack Benny when confronted by a robber who demanded, “Your money or your life!”
When Jack didn’t answer he repeated, “I said your money or your life!” After a pregnant pause Jack responded, “I’m thinking, I’m thinking!”
I pondered Pat’s question and remembered a curious experience of mine that might cause me to want to answer, “I’m thinking, I’m thinking!” I shall try to put that experience down here on paper.
The Transmigration of Souls
Latent knowledge can be tapped-into
by comingling temporal and spatial observations
to permit travel through time and space mutually,
by measuring time in inches and distance in seconds.
Here’s how to get started…
Find yourself an unobstructed view of the horizon,
and hold the view of that horizon steady.
Now, in your imagination,
connect yourself by a single strand of string
to the center of the Earth
and start circumnavigating the horizon,
slowly at first, then faster and faster
until your body quakes and you emerge shaken,
a full second or two into the future.
This experience could save you from
getting run over by a truck on your walk home.
There is no charge for this revelation.
Practice it enough times and you might experience
an actual transmigration of souls…
Oh, and did I mention,
I take the title of that James Bond movie seriously,
“You Only Live Twice.”
There, I got it down on paper and hope it satisfies my good friend and colleague, Pat, who after reading my manifesto, humored me by suggesting we go together to the very spot where my little trip through time took place, and see if it could happen for him too. So we’re going to hike up to the very spot, up on the flume trail in the springtime, and see what happens.
In truth, I would hate for Pat to get ahead of me in time, for I am counting on him to say a few kind words at my funeral and make me look like Mr. Rogers. I might even ask him to pass around a little taffy and shed a tear if he can wring one out.
Then, in my life beyond, I shall look out over Pat and try to keep him out of trouble, which will no doubt keep me busy and on the jump. I shall be an angel on his shoulder so to speak, and will keep him from jaywalking and skiing too fast and eating Ding Dongs.
It will not be an easy mission, but I will have time to rest myself while Pat sleeps, so I’m confident I will be up to the task, and be able to keep him safe until he can join me in the Great Beyond.
— For more than 30 years, in over 4,000 performances, columnist and Chautauquan McAvoy Layne has been dedicated to preserving the wit and wisdom of “The Wild Humorist of the Pacific Slope,” Mark Twain. As Layne puts it: “It’s like being a Monday through Friday preacher, whose sermon, though not reverently pious, is fervently American."
