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Crazy Train


TO: James and Chuck
From: Sandra
Subject: Crazy Train (of thought)

This morning I was lying in bed, thinking about how irritated I used to get at Jack when he would harass me because I didn’t take my turn on a game fast enough. There is this app called “Words with Friends” and it is basically an electronic version of Scrabble. Jack played with a lot of people and it would take me a day or two to remember to open the app to make a play. He would send an email reminding me that it was my turn and lay this big guilt trip on me because I didn’t play quickly enough and it would piss me off. This morning I felt guilty about being irritated with him and said out loud, “I’m sorry Jack, I should have been more patient with you.” Then I wondered if he was actually out there somewhere listening or if things are actually as he believed, when you die you are simply gone.

It is a scary thing to contemplate because that means we only exist as long as people who remember us exist. It made me think of the ancestors I have found on Ancestry.com and the fact that the only thing I know about most of them are their names and where they lived. I am lucky enough to have known four of my great grandparents (all of my mom’s grandparents). As long as I am alive, my memories of them will be alive, but my kids never knew them, so they will die with me.

My train of thought eventually made it to this: not only do we continue in the memories of people, we exist physically in them as well. I was made from atoms that came from my mother’s body. Her mother made hers and my great grandmother made hers, etc. So biologically, it is possible that I have atoms in me from all of the people I am a descendant of.

Thinking about that made me think about something I used to talk to my students about, which is that the atoms that I am made of have made other organisms before me. It is possible that I have carbon in me that once was part of a T-Rex. That’s kind of cool.


To: Sandra and James
From: Chuck
Subject: RE: Crazy Train (of thought)

Soul Train.

It’s refreshing to read a non-depth psychologist’s thoughts on depth psychology.  It just meshes better with mine – even if everyone is still saying the same things – more or less.  Until you got to the atoms.  That’s past where they go.  That was cool.  But I have to say that the odds of us sharing an atom with a trilobite is so much greater than that of a T-Rex.  269 times more likely to be precise.  They both died out during a mass extinction, but the T-Rex was around for only a million years before their extinction event.

Since we’re remembering these creatures and sharing atoms with them, do they still exist in some plane?

As we shed old cells and build new ones do we change “en masse” and form a new social zeitgeist from some atomic memory in the cell?

Was it even my turn and if it was, was I responding in time?

Can I use was and was next to each other and in the same sentence?

I hope Jack is enjoying your emails and laughing at the realization that he was wrong about something.

They call me Chuck?


To: Sandra and Chuck
From: James
Subject: RE: Crazy Train (of thought)

All I can say is this:

Having known you all these years and debated politics with you all these years Sandra, despite Chuck’s assessment of the likelihood of such inheritance, I have absolutely NO DOUBT, that you are largely made up of T-Rex atoms . . . .


To: James and Chuck
From: Sandra
Subject: RE: Crazy Train (of thought)

You are the only person I can stand to argue politics with. I refuse to discuss it with anyone else.

Maybe this is what reincarnation really is. Just the recycling of atoms in other organisms. Digital information can be recorded on almost anything, so maybe something was stored on them from organisms they used to comprise, I could use some of that T Rex mojo right now.

I was lying there trying to work out the mechanics of sharing atoms. When a female child is made, they have all the eggs they’re ever going to have, so my kids were made with atoms that came straight from my mom, essentially. As they grew while I was pregnant, all of their atoms came from me. We have cells that we never shed, brain cells, neurons etc, so we always have atoms we got from our mothers in us. Hmmm. This is going to require some alcohol to think through. I’ll get back to you on Monday.

I don’t know if Jack was right or wrong, I hope, in a way he was wrong because the last 10 years of his life really sucked and he deserves something better.


To: Sandra and Chuck
From: James
Subject: RE: Crazy Train (of thought)

The only reason you can argue politics with me is because you know that I really don’t support the position I’m arguing for.



To: James and Chuck
From: Sandra
Subject: RE: Crazy Train (of thought)

Partly, and partly because you don’t fall back on name calling. I do miss it though.

I hate that most conversations these days devolve into political complaining. I was talking to an old friend not too long ago and he told me he was going to South Dakota. I said if you go to Mount Rushmore check out the plaque that has the name of the people who made Mount Rushmore, my grandpa’s name is there. I think it’s cool that my last name is attached to a piece of American history like that. And he agreed then he said something about it only lasting as long as the liberals allow it to because they are erasing our history.

Why does that have to happen?


To: Sandra and James
From: Chuck
Subject: RE: Crazy Train (of thought)

That’s weird.  I didn’t know that Mother Nature was a liberal...


To: James and Chuck
From: Sandra  
Sent: Friday, August 24, 2018 10:45 AM

Everyone knows that


To: Sandra and Chuck
From: James
Subject: RE: Crazy Train (of thought)

Yeah, I mean she IS a woman, after all . . . .


To: Sandra and Chuck
From: James
Subject: RE: Crazy Train (of thought)

She’s also part of the “Me Too” movement.  Had some trouble with Father Time . . .

To: James and Chuck
From: Sandra
Subject: RE: Crazy Train (of thought)

Everything that I am made of was created 15,000,000,000 years ago (is that enough zeros?). Wow, you would think we would be smarter by now. There is a lot of knowledge in these atoms.

Wish I had some of Newton’s atoms in me, he is the one I admire the most. He made my life miserable with his invention of calculus, but that is why I admire him so much.

“What, there are no math equations that can describe this? Here, let me make some.”

Then he created Calculus. He had to have been an opium user to come up with THAT stuff.


To: Sandra and Chuck
From: James
Subject: RE: Crazy Train (of thought)

I wish I had Tesla atoms. 

To: James and Chuck
From: Sandra
Subject: RE: Crazy Train (of thought)

Well, your hair always seems electrified.



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