Hello, this is Amorella. While at the newly renovated Smithsonian American History Museum orndorff captured this photo of the last life mask of Abraham Lincoln. Richard tweaked it to tone down the reflected camera light. He likes this mask better than some of the portraits.
President Lincoln looks at rest, a peace with himself within this mask. I would hope he is still at peace within himself. This world as it is has a way of beating people down.
This is Grandma, boy. Nature is what it is. You want to be at peace with old Grandma, you accept what you can’t change, the old ‘serenity prayer’ will do.
Grandma [Mae Freeman] Schick used to have that prayer hanging on the kitchen wall when she lived in the north end, on Schreyer Place, in Clintonville, in Columbus when I was growing up. She suffered from arthritis for as long as I knew her. I think of her every time I am reminded of that prayer. People suffer from many pains in their lives. It is the way of living in the world, but I would hope pain is not a punishment in the afterlife, if there is an afterlife. If there is, then having no afterlife would be more humane.
Are you questioning a human concept of Hell, boy?
I am, Amorella. As a human being I have a right to question anything, in my mind at least. I also have the responsibility to have thought about it before I question. Hell does not fit where forgiveness will.
On our trip we had a discussion about how the founding fathers treated slaves and how it would be to free them with no education or skills. Also, what if the husband died and his estate bankrupt as many were of the gentry because the Louisiana Purchase caused the price of land to drop.
Some had the slaves sold so the spouse could survive. I cannot imagine the heartache this would cause to slave and slaveholder alike. We had a good discussion but nothing was resolved. The world of human beings is full of complications both in logic and in emotional feelings and personal responsibilities as well as one’s own individual sense of ethics.
I would hope G---D would be compassionate whether one believed in Jesus or Buddha or someone else. We are indoctrinated in our upbringing, our setting and economic place in life as we start this adventure. Ideas and concepts take hold young and children have little choice whether it is family religion or politics or economic conditions.
Hell does not appear rational in my mind, other than the way HeavenOrHellBothOrNeither is set up in the books. Everyone has Free Will and self-chooses where/how to be mentally at any particular place in being Dead. It works in a fiction of my/your [Amorella’s] own creation.
The existential concept was already in your head, orndorff. I just brought it out. It has been there since you studied Sartre’s “No Exit” while in Dr. John Coulter’s class at Otterbein College. You had him for many of your sixty semester hours of English, almost double the number needed.
I had to take the classes to build my average so I could graduate. I didn’t earn very good grades, but I enjoyed my English and history classes more than any of the others. I love Dr. Coulter to this day. I am thankful for many of my lifetime of teachers.
You are thinking of the list, the names of those teachers. Most everyone has their lists of those who instilled their formal and not so formal education. A good place for forgiveness to begin, don’t you think, orndorff?
I had not thought about it, I am back to Lincoln’s face mask. I like the facsimile of Lincoln on the five dollar bill better than on the penny. I do not know about forgiving others. I do though. Forgiving myself, now there’s the rub.
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