Not long after I got engaged to the woman who would be my second wife, she began to listen to strange late night radio shows, where she learned about the impending "rapture" - the theory of a sudden ascension of Christians to heaven, later popularized in fiction books such as Left Behind. She also read a book - one of the few she had read in her life - that covered the same subject, with the addition, as I recall, of the involvement of aliens.
Just my luck. It was a time when I was looking for stability in my life, sanity, after some years that had come mostly from a bottle, and so the advent of this sudden madness was frustrating and disappointing, and, in fact, almost led to a sudden end to our plans for the future together. It didn't matter anyway, for she was going to heaven, you see, on October 31st or whatever (I don't remember the magic date now).
According to the information she had received, she would hear a sounding of trumpets, which would be followed by the appearance of the Lord in the skies and then the sudden bodily departure of his children from the earth.
I remember talking to her on the phone on the very night of this rapture. She had called to say goodbye. I myself would not be going, because I refused to believe.
Suddenly, she interrupted our conversation. She had heard something, from far away ... What was it? Was it a horn? Yes, it was a horn, a trumpet, a ...
Oh, wait, it was only a train whistle. She lived close to the tracks near the Columbia slough. I could hear it on my end of the phone too.
Well, goodnight, I said. I'll see you in the morning.
Oh no you won't.
Oh yes I will.
Oh no you won't.
Well ...
It was a great blow for her when the Lord didn't come that night. But by and by she returned to life and we married and stayed married for 13 years.
And then 9/11 happened. And the radio shows began again. And there were aliens and lizard people, the new world order, the illuminati, and the Lord and the rapture.
And then that blew over too. And so did our marriage.
Round and round and round we go. I am told lately by my stepson that she is predicting the immanent end yet again, which is putting a damper on his vision of his future. The blood moon is upon us, after all, and the anti-Christ and the false prophet just met in Babylon (Washington DC), and Gog and Magog are rising in the east.
But relax. Just breathe. The end is not yet, though come it will, like a thief in the night. And there will be no more death, and no more sorrow and no more tears, and, most of all, no more waiting.
Just my luck. It was a time when I was looking for stability in my life, sanity, after some years that had come mostly from a bottle, and so the advent of this sudden madness was frustrating and disappointing, and, in fact, almost led to a sudden end to our plans for the future together. It didn't matter anyway, for she was going to heaven, you see, on October 31st or whatever (I don't remember the magic date now).
According to the information she had received, she would hear a sounding of trumpets, which would be followed by the appearance of the Lord in the skies and then the sudden bodily departure of his children from the earth.
I remember talking to her on the phone on the very night of this rapture. She had called to say goodbye. I myself would not be going, because I refused to believe.
Suddenly, she interrupted our conversation. She had heard something, from far away ... What was it? Was it a horn? Yes, it was a horn, a trumpet, a ...
Oh, wait, it was only a train whistle. She lived close to the tracks near the Columbia slough. I could hear it on my end of the phone too.
Well, goodnight, I said. I'll see you in the morning.
Oh no you won't.
Oh yes I will.
Oh no you won't.
Well ...
It was a great blow for her when the Lord didn't come that night. But by and by she returned to life and we married and stayed married for 13 years.
And then 9/11 happened. And the radio shows began again. And there were aliens and lizard people, the new world order, the illuminati, and the Lord and the rapture.
And then that blew over too. And so did our marriage.
Round and round and round we go. I am told lately by my stepson that she is predicting the immanent end yet again, which is putting a damper on his vision of his future. The blood moon is upon us, after all, and the anti-Christ and the false prophet just met in Babylon (Washington DC), and Gog and Magog are rising in the east.
But relax. Just breathe. The end is not yet, though come it will, like a thief in the night. And there will be no more death, and no more sorrow and no more tears, and, most of all, no more waiting.
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