A Conversation Still Floating Through Space

(The following dialog was inspired by an actual conversation that took place under the stars, ankle deep in a swimming pool we were forbidden to be in.)

We sat on the edges of an inground swimming pool. The back tips of our shorts barely grazing the top of the water, as it comfortably moved around the meat of our calves. Chris was packing his bubbler, while I sat  starring up at the stars. We were waiting for the hash brownies (we had spent all night preparing) to finish cooking in the oven. It was close to 2am, the sky was crystal and the stars served for a marvelous suburban backdrop beyond the streetlights and telephone poles. I had remembered a floating star I swore to have saw just the other day, and I had stayed curious to what it was.

“So, tell me if I’m crazy or not. I was starring up at the stars the other night and I saw one of the specs of light start floating through the sky. It was gliding at a consistent speed, almost identical to the rate of a flying airplane. Only this was way to high up for an airplane. I know for fact, pretty much, unless maybe, the airplane was at maximum altitude? Nah, no way, it couldn’t have been.”

“Dude, It could of been a satellite, “replied Chris.

My eyes widened as I spoke,

“Yes, you know what? It had to be a satelitte. For Sure.”

“Yea, you said it was kind of just floating at a constant rate, right?”

I shook my head non-chalantley.

“I’ve been talking to Brian a lot about stars, how they’re really not there. It takes their light so long to travel to our eyes that we are actually seeing the light they left behind. We are seeing snapshots of stars through time. They are long gone from where we think we see them”

Chris Holds in a hit. The smoke starts billowing out from his mouth while he talks.

“Yea, A lightyear is around 5-6 trillion miles. Every lightyear is a full year of time that it takes light to find our eyes.”

“Okay, yea. I always kinda knew what a lightyear was.”

I go to take a hit myself but I’m having trouble getting my lighter to spark through the wind.

Chris continues, “So if a star is 10 lightyears away, it takes 10 years for the light to appear to our vision. So, think about this…If it’s taking so long for us to see the light from other planets, then that would mean the same for us.”

“What’s the same, ” I ask.

“Earth is a star too. If there is intelligent life out there in the universe, in the cosmic suburbs similiar to our own, If their is life gazing upon our light in their sky with their ‘eyes’, they must also be seeing a snapshot of the earth through time. They are seeing us in a more primitive state; a past reflection. Heck, if you go far enough into the universe… we literally disappear. The earth is almost 14 billion years old. So if you go 14 billion lightyears or 6 trillion x 14 billion miles into the universe, our light, our existence is undetecable. Our creation is undetectable.”

I respond enthusiastically, “Yes, but even closer. Just go 500 lightyears, and what would you be seeing? A whole different planet Earth. But, if this intelligence is more intelligent than our own, perhaps a device, or telepahtic insight, intuitive in their consciousness, can warp this difference in time and transcend through its own nothingness, seeing light as it’s born.”

Chris gazes up at the stars, it looks as though he’s seeing past the wall we call space. He breaks the silence,

“The limtis to things can be so inspiring and defeating at the same time. Impossibilities that are possible can and do lay beyond our limits in consciousness. I mean, if our DNA is only 2% different then apes. 2%, and we’ve developed the intelligence to manipulate our own enviornment, the technology to fly into space, and the power of detailed intuition,  what’s 2% more capable of? No wonder “they’re” long gone.”

We both lean back, supporting ourselves with our elbows pushing into the cement ground, so we can better gaze at the tiny specs of light; The cosmic communication traveling through lightyears.

“That 2% difference lies in collective consciousness,”I begin to tell Chris, “Look at us and look at apes. Both species have communal tendancies but humans are way more ‘connected’. Compassion, language, art, music, and even mobile devices are all tribute to a greater collective consciousness by the sharing of human thoughts, expressions, and emotions. A 2% difference in DNA in the opposite direction of Apes must have a better grasping and involvement in the whole, single consciousness of the universe. Humans still perceive themselves to have separate consciousness and to be detached individuals. It is so evident, the power of togetherness.”

Chris finishes what’s left in the pipe, empties the water from the bowl and starts packing up his equipment. Some pot blows away in the wind while he’s talking,

“Maybe the internet is the next level of consciousness, and we are not creating it, but evolving into it. You could even figure out the mood of the internet by checking trending keyword searches. Sometimes you’ll find the majority of people searching for  angry words, sometimes for happy words, all depending upon the collective mood of the net. What do you think the mood of the internet was when Michael Jackson died, or when O’Bama got elected? Sad, hopeful…”

“Even beyond keywords”, I reply, “We have so many social platforms to express our emotions, and these platforms are connected to other platforms, and are fowarded to firends platforms, and so on. The connectivity of the internet is more powerful then the view we get at first glance. The internets consciousness may be the greater collective consciousness we are talking about.”

Chris, rather melancholic, responds, “I’m afraid though, that the more we ‘give’ ourselves to the internet, the more we, as a race, will physically deteriorate.”

I believe in the universe to much to believe that this physical deterioration is a bad thing,

“Well, the thing about collective consciousness is that our current facet of consciousness that continually connects to our physical body, will not dissapear. It will continue to exist in some cyber form. Perhaps, our consciousness will latch on to the form of our Facebook profiles. (We both giggle for a second before the idea sinks in and our eyes widen with mental urgency). It’ll express itself through status updates and experience moments through digital pictures. We will hang out in desired social groups and life will become a whole lot more…well, connected.”

“Eh, We’ll be long gone by then,” Chris says.

I rebut,

“Yes, but our current conscious energy won’t.”

Chris, Inspired by my response,

“Perhaps, just maybe, when we die…we are reborn inside the internet, using the continuity of our cyberselves as our identity?”

I look to my phone to check the time, and realize the brownies have been in the oven for way to long.

“Dude! The Brownies! They’re going to burn. Let’s go.”

Chris jumps up,”Shit, let’s go.”

I hear him shouting something as he’s running,

“You want to watch Wormhole?”

We run inside with the brims of our shorts dripping with pool water. Chris fumbles his pipe whilst trying to open the door but he luckily catches it with his right hand, despite being a lefty. We open the oven to find a burnt brownie cake that borders the line of edibility, but doesn’t quite cross it.