in the collective elevator of life

dear joan osborne: the proper grammar is, "what if god were one of us?". best regards: ace.

one of the lines of the song says «What would you ask if you had just one question?» - meaning what would you ask god if you had the chance. i gave this some thought. the journalistic w's come immediately to mind - who, what, where, when, why and sometimes how. yes, how is a w in the same way that y is a vowel. sometimes.

you wouldn't want to be asking something specific like «when will i be debt-free?» or something useless like «what does green taste like?» or «where have all the flowers gone?». these do not greatly advance your knowledge, much less the general pool of knowledge owned by all mankind. simply asking who or what or when isn't worthwhile. those are specific question words that require more details and serve to narrow things down. those will not do. the way i'd want to go with this is something more general, open-ended, something that would encourage a bit of a convo with god. your best bet for gaining anything other than a short answer and a sense of supreme frustration is to go with «why?» or «how?».

imagine the scenario: there you are with god, maybe floating around in space where you can breathe without a space helmet b/c you are on a ride-along with god, and you just point to the earth and go, «what?» and you'll get an answer like, «ROCK AND WATER, MUD AND RAIN, TREE AND FLOWER AND FIELD.» b/c apparently god talks like tonto. um... right. anyway, the point is that «what» isn't going to get you much. imagine «when» or «where» and again - you are not going to gain much, are you?

but point at the earth and go - «why?» -- oOoOoOoO! now that one's promising. you are sure to get at least a few paragraphs out of that one. equally profitable would be «how?» - it's sure to turn out some meaty verbiage.

so, it's down to «why?» or «how?». which would you choose? are you a why'er - someone who wants to know the motives behind the production? or, are you a how'er - someone who wants to know about the engine? i am more of a how'er myself. i want a schematic.

and do you think if you heard «why?» or «how?» that you would understand it? or would it be like an mechanical engineer explaining the intricacies of an elevator to a 2-year-old? that kid is not even going to have the beginnings of the necessary vocabulary of images - much less a vocabulary of words - to assign meaning to the things the mechanical engineer would say. the mechanical engineer would have to dumb it down, draw pictures, explain only some small part of the operations of the box that carries us up & down. meanwhile, the kid is running around, pressing the buttons, looking out the windows [yes, it's a glass elevator - durr], enjoying the feeling of rising & falling, looking at the people coming in & out, sticking his hand in the closing door. the kid's not paying attention and probably wouldn't understand even if he did. the explanation is right there for the taking, but there is no possible way the kid can take it.

what if god were one of us? how would we act? eh... we'd probably keep running around pressing all the freaking buttons & sticking our collective hand in the closing door. we is what we is. we don't know any better and that's okay. just don't presume that because you do not notice god among us, that god is not here.