October 18: Time to Time, Difficult Questions, Exact Date of My Death

Billy knew nothing about it.  He dreamed on, and traveled in time and so forth.  The hospital was so crowded that Billy couldn't have a room to himself.  He shared a room with a Harvard history professor named Bertram Copeland Rumfoord.  Rumfoord didn't have to look at Billy, because Billy was surrounded by white linen screens on rubber wheels.  But Rumfoord could hear Billy talking to himself from time to time.

Rumfoord's left leg was in traction.  He had broken it while skiing.  He was seventy years old, but had the body and spirit of a man half that age.  He had been honeymooning with his fifth wife when he broke his leg.  Her name was Lily.  Lily was twenty-three.

Billy is oblivious to the fact that his wife is dead.  Well, he knows that his wife dies of carbon monoxide poisoning as she is driving to the hospital to see him.  He knows that he survives the plane crash that put him in the hospital bed.  He knows that he survives the bombing of Dresden.  He pretty much knows his entire life, from the day he will be born to the day he will die.

I'm not sure I would like that kind of knowledge.  Certainly, it would come in handy every once in a while. It would take the edge off difficult questions.  Will I hit a deer with my car on my way home from school tonight?  Will I get my kitchen and bathroom ceilings fixed?  Will the baby in the hall outside my office stop crying?  Will Donald Trump start a nuclear war?  I would know the answers to all those questions right now if I were Billy Pilgrim.

But I certainly wouldn't want to know the exact date of my death.  I wouldn't want to know when my parents die.  Or my spouse or children.  I don't think I could live with that information in my head all the time.  Of course, I have a very limited, human understanding of time.  I'm not able to jump backward to my high school prom or forward to the birth of my grandchild.  I won't be taking a flying saucer ride to Tralfamadore any time soon, either.

So that leaves me with this moment.  I'm exhausted and hungry.  The baby in the hallway has stopped crying.  In less than two hours, I will be in front a classroom full of students, trying to impart some kind of knowledge about doing research.  In about five hours, I will be in my car, driving home.  That is my present and not-too-distant future.

Saint Marty is thankful this afternoon for the silence of his office.