Gilda Trillim

by Steven L. Peck

  “I thought I would be met by my family when I died?” I said. Which was odd for I had not really practiced Mormonism for a long time and had ceased to even believe that it was possible to know what an afterlife would be like should there even be one. Yet I had kept up a hope that it was right in the broad outlines. There was, however, little room for dragonflies in what I had imagined for the hereafter.

  “You are not dead,” it said, “you are in the spirit realm. Learn what you can. I am your guide. What would you know?” It darted back and forth and up and down as it said these things, giving the sentences in cadence with its pitch and plunge. Yet all the while keeping the shuttlecocks in play.

  There is one thing that has always perplexed me. Something that had puzzled me since the time I was a small child. I remember staying the night at my grandmother’s house in Boise in the late summer. She lived on a tree-lined neighborhood street, not so busy as to be a major thoroughfare, but with enough traffic that one had to be watchful if chasing a ball into the road. I slept in a room near the street. I remember lying awake at night watching the shadows on the wall shifting and sliding as cars passed by, marking the room with small slats of light created by the passing vehicles’ headlamps shining through the blinds. These patterned patches of illumination traced a bright path from one side of the room to the other as the cars moved past. Back then I liked to imagine it tracing my life on Earth. So the place where the patch began its sojourn across my room represented my birth, and when it was extinguished at the end of its trajectory, my death. As night progressed, the cars would become less frequent and I would mentally wander back to the pre-existence where souls lived with God until being born into an earthly life. Then, I pondered even further back, to the origin of everything. I wondered who made God, or when it all had started. There was a song we sang in Church sometimes, with the line, “D’ye think that ye could ever / Through all eternity / Find out the generation / Where Gods began to be?” The song dripped with mystery and filled my imagination with profound wonderings and unfathomable cogitations. Where did it all start? It was an enormous question. Big enough that as I looked at the bouncing dragonfly before me I was prompted to daring. I continued to watch the insect play about me like an opponent on a court for just a moment longer, then boldly begged, “Show me the beginning of everything.”

  “The beginning of the universe?” It inquired brightly.

  “No. Before that. The very beginning. Surely, the ‘Big Bang’ as they are calling it now, must have come from somewhere. Yes? There must be conditions and capacities that obtained in something even bigger that made it possible for it to occur. Right? I want to know the beginning of everything. Of universes. Of whatever extra space graced existence such that a big bang could occur, and to see whatever conditions had to unfold to let that prior space evolve, and on and on. I want the foundational event. If it was God show me God. If it was something else show me that. And if it is a reoccurrence that repeats endlessly, then take me above it and let me look down upon it so I can understand what I am.”

  The dragonfly dropped the shuttlecocks it had been juggling. It stayed in one place now, hovering just above my eyes. It was silent a long time before it answered, “You will need greater guides than I.”

  And it disappeared.

  The First Guide

  I found myself on a red and white tiled checkerboard floor extending off into the distance until it disappeared over the horizon. Above me, a vault of a deep blue-black sky filled with numerous galaxies, stars, and planets that played above me in an as rich and varied dance as anything in our western night sky. There was music playing, the music of the spheres I guessed because it washed over me with such beauty and pathos that I felt I would be broken in half by the sound. It was like nothing I’d ever heard. As I looked at the orbs above me, it seemed that in some sense they were indeed dancing to the strains playing in concert around me.

  A breeze was blowing and I noticed that from far far away in the distance, a moving point alone in the vast plain was heading my way. Finally, I could see that it was something like a dog running toward me. It was coming quickly and as it neared it resolved into a coyote—lean and hungry, its coat ragged and torn. It was wounded in several places along its flank as if it had been in a fight with another animal.

  It approached me, addressed me in German (which I again understood), and identified itself as Herr Professor Schelling, a Natural Philosopher. He said he was the first of three guides who would show me what I wished—the beginning of all things. I asked him about the wounds he bore. He snarled viciously: “These I received from my enemies!”

  He then growled savagely and nipped at the air as if trying to fend off an attack from above. He settled back down and scratched his neck with his back leg, then stood and said, “Follow me.”

  He took off at a run. I had a dream-like sense that I had to keep up with him and that if I did not, my journey would end there. Fatally. So I sprinted after him. We ran like the wind, and still I could not keep up, he was running too fast. Without understanding why, I dove like a swim racer off a platform into the air. I found myself flying inches off the floor like Superman, my body occasionally bouncing lightly off the tiles. If I could just keep from landing I knew I would be able to keep up, so I concentrated harder and soon found myself flying capably through the air, like a bullet. I caught up to the coyote-Schelling creature and he led me across the tiles. Finally, after some time I yelled to him, “Where are we going?”

  He glanced back and yelped, “To the beginning.”

  Soon the galaxies above disappeared, as if we had run beyond them, and now only a dark emptiness made up the dome of the sky. The eerie illumination that came from the tiled floor remained, although we seemed to be running through a vast and immense emptiness. We traveled like this for years, decades, centuries, eons, we ran the age of the earth, and of the universe and its birth in a fiery flash, but we did not stop and eons came and went, time unimaginable passed. Until at last we came to the end of the checkered floor which terminated in a precipice into nothing. At this edge we stopped. There was nothing but blackness above and before us, except far away beyond the rim and somewhat below us was a strange gray sphere.

  “What is that?” I felt awestruck and frightened.

  Afraid I should have known I squeaked. “Is it God? Plotinus’s One?

  The coyote looked at me for a long time and started coughing and threw up a pink mass, which it quickly ate. “It is the Ungrund! The ground from which all Being sprang! Even God and all the Gods! We are looking from the past, at a beginning so distant that you cannot fathom it. That is all there was once, if once is a word that can be used in this case.”

  “It was not sitting in space as you now see it from this place, it was absolutely alone, single, undifferentiated, and insentient, there was no qualia emanating from its substance, for substance it was, and substance it wasn’t. You cannot comprehend. Do not try. It was not nothing, that is all that can be said. It lacked all motion, for there was nowhere to go. It could not be divided for there was no left nor right, no up nor down, no inner nor outer. No accidents. Just essence. No space nor time could touch it. For it filled all there was. There was nothing but it.”

  “Was it aware of itself?”

  “Awareness takes difference. There must be something to be aware of? No? Aware of itself? Impossible. Certainly not as the self-contemplating itself thing Plotinus envisioned as first cause for it perceived no future, no past, no now. None of those existed. It was Not-nothing. Nothing else. It had only will. Not awareness. Not consciousness. Not perception. Only will.”

  “How then did we come to this?” I said, pointing back toward the place the galaxies had disappeared long ago.

  “It annihilated itself.”

  “What?”

  “It annihilated itself. The first great sacrifice. The one on which all others are patterned. The atonement that underlies all others and upon which all subsequent gods will patter
n their own incarnations. It destroyed that oneness and became many. It created all lights, energy, matter, motion in one great act of destruction. It started deep time. It opened a universe in which newness and novelty are possible because differences exist and gradients parse out variance—difference upon which all things can work. It was will in motion. Yet without thought. Without awareness. Without sentience.”

  Long I stared at it. Trying like I did with the apple seeds to ascertain its nature. Finally, as if sensing my intent, the coyote continued, “You will get nothing from it. It has no parts, nor emanations to sense. It spans all dimensions—an infinity of such—because there are none. It is division by zero of zero. It exists and is all that exists. Therefore it is nothing. And everything. It is being and non-being. Everything, for it alone exists simply. And non-being because it stands in relation to no other thing.”

  “Surely the laws of mathematics hold, so there are transcendental realities even now when this thing sat alone. Are there not?”

  “You speak from an age in which they exist. So this grounding is impossible to understand. Then (and I say ‘then’ only to give a hook for the mind to grasp, but ‘then’ and ‘now’ have no meaning ‘when’ this existed), there was no time, for what changed? There were no logical relations, for upon what would they be structured? When there is only one thing, what can be added or subtracted? If there are no circles, can pi find an ideal existence? What is logically possible when there is no contrary? When there is no ‘either,’ ‘or,’ nor even an ‘and?’ If there is no middle wherein can be found an excluded middle? If there is no possibility, where can we find an ‘if’ or a ‘then’?”

  I looked at my guide and said, “And yet here we are. Then at least the object had capacity? For if there were no capacity, surely it would be there still (whatever ‘still’ and ‘there’ might mean), would it not?”

  Then the coyote howled long and loud. His cries piercing the silence with a yap that spoke of depth of longing. A yowl that vibrated around the universe. Then these words, “The mystery! Profound and without reasons! An event without a cause! The first true random act. Random in ontology! Who can understand? For the thing annihilated itself! And in that annihilation infinite dimensions open! As when matter is destroyed in your universe, utterly and irrevocably, energy in abundance is released, so when the original thing ceased, ‘new’ formed and dimensions were born. Universes many! Universes with differences! Variation! Change! And in that change, time! A sacrifice of sorts yet by what grace no one knows, yet in such however bringing into existence, through the first stochastic motion in a universe structured by randomness, the first moment in a random walk of unending change! And why not! Could there be cause and effect in an undifferentiated universe? No. But randomness! Sweet randomness! Therein lies the secret of all.”

  Suddenly, the Shelling-coyote looked around, frightened, “My time is nearly gone. The next guide comes. I must bid you goodbye. I am pursued and must flee.”

  He looked at me and sighed, “Opposition has entered the world. Just as I predicted was necessary!” He winked at me once and was gone.

  I suddenly felt terribly alone. I sat on the edge of the checkered floor, my legs dangling over the profound empty nothingness. In the distance, the thing that would be all was expanding in an explosion of color such as I had never before imagined possible, colors I’d never seen; sounds beyond any musical note. Everything was born in this explosion? “Well at least beauty,” I thought, as I watched existence unfold.

  The Second Guide

  As I watch the blackness that surrounded the odd sphere, something new appeared lightly above it and to the side. Shortly, I realized it was unmistakably heading my way. I could not imagine what it was as it moved through the profound emptiness, but as it got closer it was soon apparent that it was a sailing ship with sails unfurled and brimming with air and driving itself toward me. It steered toward my location and pulled up next to the tiled floor upon which I sat. A gangplank was lowered and off marched an aristocratic tortoise, its neck long and obscene. Upon its back rode a rock pigeon, and upon that plump bird’s head sat a round and sturdy carabid beetle. This last creature provided voice for the odd trio. The ship was manned by a crew of rough and randy chimpanzees who moved through the ship’s rigging like trapeze artists—executing fantastic leaps, daring flips, dives, and climbs amidst the cordage and sails.

  The tortoise approached and the beetle hailed me from atop the pigeon, “Greetings! I, Charles Darwin, will be your guide for the next phase of your adventure.”

  The turtle made a kind of curtsy, while the pigeon bowed almost toppling the beetle.

  “Which of you is Darwin?” I asked smiling, for despite the strangeness of our encounter, there was a sense of fun and carnival about the spectacle of these three guides and their introduction.

  “Which indeed!” said the beetle. “You’ll find as we introduce the tri-fold necessities that allow a maneuvering toward complexity my three-fold representation will serve you well. We are all together us, that is, Charles Darwin. At your service.”

  They bowed and curtsied again and bid me follow them onto the ship. I climbed up the plank and hopped onto the vessel. Once aboard, the gangplank was pulled in and we ambled toward the forecastle. The craft left behind the vast checkerboard plain and bore swiftly toward the exploding thing that was starting to fill the horizon with a wondrous display of brilliant hues and colors coalescing into a multitude of shapes and structures unimaginably gorgeous—beauty of such astonishing intricacy that I found words failed me, patterns with edges that folded and twisted into shapes that were indescribably stunning in complexity and rich in exquisite delicacy.

  The imperial tortoise then for the first time spoke, its voice deep and compelling, and uttered with grave solemnity, “Behold the birth of all.”

  As we watched, bright lights flared and flashed among the swirling colors.

  I whispered, “Are those stars caught in the act of creation?” And then it hit me—the flashes I was watching might be even more than mere stars, “Or are they the ‘Big Bangs’ that mark the genesis of entire universes?” I said in awe.

  The turtle turned to me, locking its ageless eyes upon mine, “Come. Let us see.” As if at his command, the ship steered toward one of the flashes. We gained its proximity with incredible speed and sailed boldly right into it. Out we popped into a new place, which I can only describe as an otherworldly province of blue and yellow. Words capturing the dancing structures within are beyond anything available in any language I have. They were not spheres, nor geometric shapes of any stability, and even in molten motion they seemed to have some regularity—following logic that was far beyond my ability to apprehend. Within, there were blazing flares bursting around us. “Are these explosions making universes?” I could not help but ask.

  The worthy terrapin considered a moment then explained, “There are layers and layers of complexity we must sail through to get to the level of which you speak. Come. Hang on and we will find our way through the morass of rough oceans. But there is something in particular you must see.” So, on we sailed, each time breaking for whatever flashes and flares we found in the places and structures through which we travelled. And as we entered a new flash or bubble, it opened into a new space of unfathomable depth and delight and through which we sailed until we entered a new flash of color and light. Again and again steering to a new level of existence, where complexity, rules, and laws varied in each, until we came to one in which the ship stopped. The apes furled the sails with startling speed, and we paused above what can only be loosely described as a planet—for it appeared to be a pulsating octahedron warmed by a similarly shaped orb casting off a rainbow of radiance as if it were this universe’s equivalent to a sun.

  The tortoise motioned with its head, “Behold the evolution of your gods!” And from the slime of that world arose creatures, instantiations of life. These changed, became societies, formed alliances, civilizations that grew i
n power and influence right before my eyes. Life grew in majesty and in power until they controlled the foundations of the light and matter in their universe in ways that made me gasp with breathless wonder. While it obviously all transpired on time scales unplumbed, it unfolded before my eyes and heart and understanding in a matter of minutes, as if my mind were enhanced to comprehend things unimaginable. But at the end were beings more glorious than I could grasp, encircled in an aura of exceptional light. They took that which they found about them in this place and created worlds and universes beyond imagining.

  I sat on the deck in shock and buried my head in my hands and wept, “It is too much. I’ve seen the origin of the gods!”

  “There are exalted and magnificent beings such as these shepherds in infinite spaces,” said the tortoise, “These are those on your phylogenetic lines.”

  I wept, unprepared for a lesson on deep genealogy.

  The rock pigeon flew to my shoulder and whispered in my ear, “Courage, my lady, courage. There is one thing more to learn. The three fold, the tri-fold structure that drives these changes and emergences.”

  The bird flew back to the great shelled beast, and that wise being looked at me and said, “Behold, we have traveled far, from the beginning to the now, but learn here the one thing that organizes and structures the all through which we have cut the waves with our prow. Complexity comes forth in only one way. Behold! Three things always exist. One! Wherein there is difference. Two! Wherein some structures are lost because they cannot abide, and some remain. Three! Wherein one sort of structure comes from something similar. Where there are two things and only one can remain, that which can take more of what is required to survive or do it better will go on. Behold! Variation. Behold! Differential survival. Behold! The inheritance of one thing that bestows its traits on another. Wherever the threefold is found, complexity will evolve. It will bubble up into a universe no matter how simple and humble its beginnings. You see the shepherds below? They were made this way. They wield this power to bring beings to themselves. It has happened on an infinity of universes and uncanny spaces. It happened on yours. It will happen on others. Learn it well. Complexity emerges in no other way.”