"Be everyone welcome to the magical, clamorous, graceful and ghostly parade of the dead!" yelled the capped man with the black top hat. I was just there for the show; the fair doesn't come that often to Nomanland, Alaska. The parade this year was far more organized and complete, this time they hadn't let any of the cold and pale ones into town; although obviously that was a tad hard, since here in Alaska we're all pale and cold. But something had to be done, the rapist entered the houses thinking they were still as vigorous, it was actually quiet embarrassing, watching them fall with their own steps and mumbling threats with their jawless mouths. That was actually funny, the problem was when the Catholics prayed around, whining about their sweet heaven.
"The mischievous and the good doers, the ignorant and the wise, they all end up here! Come and celebrate this electric parade of nothingness!" he said, retouching his white make-up and standing high in the allegorical car. Every year the same man came and directed the ride, he looked the same since he had come the first time. Actually I was there for the first time, so it is not like this fair is something ancient occurring since the 1800's. It was a summer, everyone would think death would like to come in a winter, for the "it gets cold across the light in the tunnel" metaphor, but hey, if they're cold they'll want some heat.
So there I was, feeling all alone in my Igloo, well not, actually I don't live in an Igloo, that's just for the stereotype's sake. But well, I was all merry and laugh in my small Igloo, de-scaling some fish, while all of a sudden we hear the classical mournful song, played by an electric guitar. Obviously we all ran to the source as good curious villagers ready to lynch anything we didn't like. So the man with the top hat and the marble-white face welcomed us into our own town, displaying the show that never was in life. Making out of something like death, a carnival.
Of course at first we were all spooked and troubled, we couldn't lynch what was already dead. We were also kind of afraid the dead might be contagious; one never knows which kinds of diseases they might bring from wherever the hell they come. They were also scared at first, they were worried life could be contagious, the difference was that they knew what kind of things life had, so they were far more careful. And so that's how we got to see Napoleon, speaking a very proficient French and talking us about this conquers as living and now, he had scored with Jeanne d'Arc , apparently he had made her believe he had finally freed France. She did have a record of believing lots of things.
In the parade I also met Oscar Wilde; he was so much more relieved, no more fights for love or dishonor for his likes. John Lennon and Gandhi were a must see for my little activist sister, so I didn't lose the chance. It happened that they were not friends; Gandhi couldn't stand that modern music thing. And of course I had to use the occasion to get to know my old great grandfather, who is said to have found Nomansland. Apparently he was blind his whole life, so he had the idea of having found a town nearby a lake, no one ever told him it was a frozen lake. And if I went on with the list of dead people I've got to meet trough the years I wouldn't be done in weeks.
But there was this one dead girl, she seemed so full of... life. She was in a plane accident, she was actually in a plane class accident, her best friend and her had been taking private lessons to learn how to fly a light aircraft. But her friend was there because of the instructor, not the class, so while looking at his "puuurfect" hair and his "dreeeameh" eyes, she didn't listen a thing, so it was her turn to pilot, and the rest is obvious. Normally in this story, the pilot should have taken control of the situation, but he was too worried being unconscious, for he was musophobic (afraid of mice). This girl had the occurrence of bringing her mouse pet to that day's lesson. So, a bit of lust and fear of mice had killed her, yet she had never felt any of those.
Her name was, while she lived, Erinelda; now that she had a choice over it, her name was Beulah, apparently she hadn't had enough bully problems back when she was alive with her name. The first time I saw her, I only say her profile and her back and mistook her for Audrey Hepburn, so I asked for her autograph, and when she turned around, it was quiet awkward to see she was just some normal gal. But away from being awkward for her, she took it very... normal. "For whom should I sign it?" she asked, very sassily. "Uhm, for... me" I ughed "Frank" i ended up saying. "Frank? What kind of name is that? I hope this is for your weird Canadian cousin" she said, not knowing that I actually had a weird Canadian cousin.
Anyways that was not really my name. "What's so wrong about that name?" I asked, as I saw her signing my notebook. "Well, it's just plain weird" she said, with a big smile, the kind of smile normal people don't criticize you with. "Oh and I bet" I read her name "Beulah is so normal."
She laughed, I laughed, then she said something like "Well at least it's way more classy than Frank" still smiling. "Well, I know of no queen who has ever been named Beulah" I said, trying to sound oh so smart-ass. "Darling, you're talking to the wrong people about the ‘who has ever been’ I hope you know that" she said, very confident of herself. "Well I bet that you won't find anyone near being queen who has ever been named Beulah." I said, knowing chances were against me. "You bet what? I hardly think you have anything to bet" she said, scolding my living body as if it was some sort of joke.
"Well, you never know" I said, "We’re sounding daring aren't we? I want sardines" she ended up saying. "The weird doesn't stop at the name right?" I said, not really considering what I was saying. "Hey, I don't judge for drinking water, which tastes like nothing. At least rotten sardines have some sort of flavor" she admitted. "some flavor..." now I was just joking. "But okay, I'll get your sardines if there is Beulah the first, what if I win?" I asked. "You won't" she said, turning around at the moving parade and then, from the very depth of her lungs she yelled "BEULAH!" and then again, from who knows where "BEULAH". This second time, I was pretty sure every single dead and living person heard.
It didn't take more than two minutes for a large group of Beulahs to approach us. Some seemed really old corpses; others were fresh as rotten eggs, all so very different. "okay ladies, oh and you," she said to a man who was named Beulah, or so it goes. "Who here was a queen?" and of course, out of the twenty farmer looking Beulahs none raised a hand or said a thing. "I win" I said. "You clearly said, and I quote 'near being a queen' so just let me interrogate these lovely dead ladies. The dead interrogation took only a couple of minutes, dead people don't have anything to hide anymore, so secrets and incomplete information are things all so very mundane for them. "Ha! this woman was near to being a queen, I win" she said, grabbing the shoulder of a Beulah who seemed, and probably was, a thousand years old. "Oh really? was she a princess?" I was quiet amazed. "Not precisely, you see, she was born in a place with no monarchy, ergo the government was a mayor, and it happens that she was the nice of the mayor" she said, nodding in a showy manner.
"A nice doesn't count!" I argued, because not even the nice of the kind is near of being the queen, ever. "I would have even go for the wife" I said, attempting her reason to sound more stupid. "Well, it happens that in her town the next one to the power was the nice of the mayor" she said, with not even a drop of lie in her eyes. "Bullshit let me ask her" I exclaimed. "Well, I hope you speak Austrian" she was just bragging. "So I take you speak Austrian" I asked, "nope" she answered. "So?" I asked again, "we dead speak the same language you silly" she said, again not a drop of lie in her eyes. "I'm simply not winning this am I?" I was pretty sure of the answer. "No Frank, you're not getting out of this
So while everyone was having fun at the parade, I was searching for sardines in my house, while Beulah waited comfortably in the sofa. “You know, you’re not allowed to be here” I yelled from the kitchen. “Well, I was not allowed to fly plains either” she said, later she told me all about the plane crash and how in the way she was trying to remember all she had saw in a shipwreck Discovery channel special. Of course that wasn’t a ship, and they were not overflying islands, it was the Pacific Ocean, which made it harder for the rescue team to ever find them.
Aside from being an anchovy and tuna, and sardine lover, she was fairly good at 90’s trivia. She had died in 1992, precisely the year my sister was born. “She must be your reincarnation” I said, commenting how annoying my sister was. “Pfft, If I was to reincarnate I would be a politician” she said, not intending any pun. “Why? So you could make a better place out of the world?” I asked kind of seriously. “Nah, so I could make a living out of lying” she said, and I laughed, and she stared; it hadn’t been a joke. “Not all the dead speak the same language do they?” I said, realizing what may had been a complex confession. “It took you a while…”
“She was not even named Beulah?” I felt so stupid, “I don’t know, but she kept asking for something, so I guess it’s some sort of food or something in whatever it was her language” she said, as if lying to get sardines was an everyday chore. “Darn, I feel so stupid” I admitted, after all the ‘we all dead speak the same language’ was way too cheesy for any girl named Beulah.
“Don’t worry, I have made people made stupider things thanks to my super lying skills” she said, tossing the last can of tuna to the trash can. “Where do you come from?” I asked after some silence.
“From the death parade, where I tricked you into giving me your food, and that’s basically how I got here” she was not only a liar but sarcastic as well. “I mean, where do you all come from? Some sort of twilight dimension where we all go when we die?” I asked, turning the atmosphere a serious one.
“Is it really necessary to know? Don’t you regret every time you find out the end of a good book before time? Is it not the worst thing when someone spoils you a good movie?” she said, omitting any sarcasm. “But what if it’s not a good book?” I asked, and then I realized I had sounded like some suicidal kid. “I kind of get you, but believe me, every single book has something to say, even if it something very stupid.” She said, in a let’s-not-speak-of-this-ever-again voice.
“I think we should get going, if the villagers know I was here they’ll try to burn me; I don’t want to lower their self esteem making them believe they can’t even burn a dead girl.” She said after we talked about plane crashes, San Bernardo dogs, underage drinking, vandalism, religion, mad houses and Kierkegaard, in that order.
“You’re so considerate, you amaze me” I said.
“Well, truth is that I’m getting bored here with you, but I was trying to have a little bit of tact… but have it your way…” she said, laughing at my almost believing hurt face. She was kind of funny but not funny looking, who likes pretty much what I like. And she was dead.
Human are still animals, we've stated that here several times, but with minds and ideas evolving at this pace are we still human after all? We have migrated from worshiping something as fenomenal and ethereal as thunder to rely on the numbers given by something as common and hard-evidenced as a computer. We have gotten away of our roots, we still share the hominid social behaviour, but we are different, we have grown so much apart from the animal that the human is. So the question is imposed. Are we human after all? Maybe. But something is true, we're losing touch.
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