Conversation With A Pagan Deity

The recent lost of our beloved Wolfgang has had me wishing for a beautiful, peaceful afterlife and thinking what an afterlife might be like if it was run by pagan deities - you know, the ones that predate skydaddy, jebus and the righteous spook.  I've always thought that in terms of religious beliefs, the new agers have a much better concept of it than the Abrahamic folks.  Their only rule is "harm none, do as you will."  I can dig that.  In fact, that is my main philosophy in life.  It's not exactly the rule of reciprocity, but it's in the same vein.  It tells me to not harm others and allows me to do my own thing without shame or guilt.  The pagan afterlife is pretty cool, too.  They go to this nice place they call Summerland, and after a period of time, they reincarnate.  Now, if summer in Summerland is anything like summer in the southern US, they can keep it.  I've already experienced enough of that, thank you.  It's akin to Dante's third circle of hell.  Reincarnation could be cool, too.  Maybe a chance to improve on the things we did wrong in this life.  Or it could suck - imagine coming back as a gay man somewhere that Islamic law is the law of the land.  Which got me to wondering about conversing with the deities who occupy this Summerland...

The setting is a nice, lush meadow.  A pleasant breeze is blowing, the sun is shining, the temperature is around 72 F.  There are wild flowers growing in the meadow, a pond is in the distance, and something colorful and radiant is also in the distance.  I'm sitting under a shade tree, bucket booty nekkid, with the bod I had at 27, and admittedly confused.  Suddenly, a woman appeared before me, and the following conversation ensued.

Momma Moonbat ("MB"):  Who are you, and where am I?

Mystery Woman ("Goddess"):  I'm a goddess, and this is Summerland.

MB:  Summerland?  As in pagan heaven?  You're shittin' me, right?

Goddess:  What's the last thing you remember before you saw me?

MB:  I was lighting an M80 tied to a Redneck Rocket with a cherry bomb super glued to it and a fire fartin' chicken rigged to the cherry bomb, and telling everyone "Hey, y'all!  Watch this!"

Goddess:  Yep.

MB:  Ah, a southerner's famous last words.

Goddess:  Yep.

MB:  Duuuuude.  Ok.  Hmmm...you do realize I was an atheist in life, don't you?

Goddess:  Yes.  We get a lot of atheists here.  We get everyone here.  This is where you go when you die.

MB:  Alright, now I'm really confused.  You're obviously not skydaddy, er, um, the Abrahamic god.  In fact, since gods apparently do exist, where is that fucker.  I want to kick him in the nuts.  And since I didn't believe in any god, does that mean I have to go to hell?

Goddess:  No, you're not going to any hell, and you were right about the Abrahamic deity.  It does not exist.  The whole pantheon is a load of bullshit.  Some fucker named Abraham decided to sell a bill of "my god is bigger than your god" to a bunch of Bronze Age goat herders who didn't know any better, and it just snowballed from there.  First, there's the original faction going off to rape, kill, pillage and loot, and saying that their god wanted them to do it.  Then the nutty fuckers break off into another faction, and then into yet a third faction, then the three divisions have their own sub-categories and each of 'em's a bit nuttier than the next.  You know that, though.  You've been living around the nuts.  By the way, I like that term skydaddy, I'll have to use it the next time I hear one of them say "heavenly father." 

MB:  Yeah, that was my way of ripping on them for that heavenly father crap.  So, how many of y'all are there, anyway?

Goddess:  I don't really know.  I never took a head count.  There's the Greek and Roman pantheons, which are the same pantheon, just with different names.  Their gods will answer to either name, so it's all good.  There's the Egyptians, the Norse, the Germanic, the Hindus, Shin tau...I know there's more.  I just can't think of them all.  Oh, the neopagan/Wiccan "the god" and "the goddess"...put that in the same heap with Abrahamic skydaddy.  It's a bunch of made-up bullshit.  Gerald Gardner pulling the same bunch of crap that the Abrahamic fuckers did.  He just wanted to see chicks naked.
MB:  Yeah, speaking of, where are my clothes?  And where are yours?  Aren't you supposed to be wearing robes or something?
Goddess:  Nobody wears clothes here.  We dwell in our natural state, but unlike the human realm, it's no biggie.  Seriously, nobody's going to be ogling your rack and no horndog is going to try to impress you with his wong.  It might feel a bit awkward at first, but you'll be used to it by tomorrow.
MB:  Alright.  As long as I don't have to deal with the pot bellied, hairy dudes who wore Speedos and commented on every woman's every flaw.  Anyway, I take it there are a lot of you gods here.  Why did y'all allow the humans to invent skydaddy and commit atrocities in his name?  Why didn't any of y'all appear before the humans and put a stop to it?

Goddess:  We're not too inclined to meddle in the affairs of humans.  Sorry.  It's just not our thing, and humans never expected it until the whole skydaddy thing came along.  Abraham had to pimp skydaddy as being all things to all people to get followers.  Pretty soon, humans are sending up requests to a nonexistent god, expecting the requests to be answered.  In order to pacify them when those requests go unfulfilled, the priests came up with the "mysterious ways" verbiage; and the people ate it.  
MB:  Sorry.  I'm going to have to call bullshit on someone here.  Either you're shall we say, historically challenged, or the so-called ancient scribes had vivid imaginations because Greek and Roman mythology is full of tales of the gods becoming involved in human matters.
Goddess:  There's a reason it was called mythology.
MB:  Touche'.  Not to change the subject, but what's with the shiny thing in the distance.  I can't seem to take my eyes off of it, and it's almost like it's calling me.

Goddess:  That's the Rainbow Bridge.  You have many beloved ones waiting for you there.  Go to them.  I'll be here when you get back.  And take your time.  It's been a while since you've seen some of them.

I head toward the Rainbow Bridge, happy that it is real, anxious to see my fin, feather, fur and scale babies again.  I'm also puzzled.  Not only are there gods, but they're not assholes like skydaddy.  At least skydaddy's not real. 

Two weeks later, I'm back under the shade tree with an entourage of pets.  As promised, the mystery goddess is waiting for me. 

Goddess:  It's so good to see y'all reunited.  That's one of the best parts about being here.  It always warms my heart to see this.
MB:  Yeah, I'm loving it.  All of my critters are here, and I've seen everyone I loved who died before me.  My grandparents mentioned that they won't be here much longer.  They said they're ready to reincarnate.  That kind of sucks.  Just as I get to see them again, they're gone. 
Goddess:  Yes, but it's a bit different here.  You won't notice that they're gone, and the memory of them will simply disappear.  It's our way of keeping sadness out of our realm.
MB:  That's pretty cool.  I'm starting to half-way understand how this place works, but what about all of the christians?  How do they react to finding out that they wasted their entire human life trying to appease that which does not exist?
Goddess:  It's a mixed bag.  Most of them aren't quite as irrational here as they were there.  Their preachers had a pretty powerful hold on them and played on their fears and greed to the hilt.  Once they get here and have concrete evidence in front of them, they usually accept it for what it is and enjoy their stay here.
MB:  What about the ones who don't? 
Goddess:  We kick 'em out.  They go back to the human realm immediately.  We saw how they fucked up your realm.  We don't want that shit here. 
MB:  The preachers - yeah, what about them?  I always thought that more than half of them didn't buy the bullshit they were selling and that it was nothing more than a hustle to them.  What happens to them when they get here?  Send 'em right back?
Goddess:  You're right in your belief that most of them were peddling a bill of goods to satiate their own greed.  We have a way of dealing with them.  They get sent back to the human realm as peasants, for lack of a better term, in areas festering with famine and disease.  Then there are the preachers who truly believed the venom they spewed.  Things get interesting where they're concerned.  For example, Jerry Falwell.
MB:  Oh, do tell.
Goddess:  When good ol' Jerry got here, it was Hera's turn to greet the newcomers.  I forgot to mention we all take turns doing that.  Anyway, Hera greets Jerry and right away he gets all red-faced and starts bellowing and foaming the mouth and spewing at Hera that she's a false god and a harlot and he's pointing at her and getting all belligerent.  Thing is, some parts of mythology are true.  Hera doesn't put up with bullshit.  At all.  I don't know what pissed her off more, being called  false god when she's there in front of him - woman, myth and legend - or being called a harlot.  Either way, Jerry stepped off into it.  Hera bitchpopped ol' Jerry upside the head, created a hell just like what he had preached all about, and tossed his ass in it.  He ain't gettin' out, either.  He gave up his chance at reincarnation when he pissed off Hera.  His hell was an eternal place, so that's just what she gave him.  If she wakes up in a good mood, she takes one of Zeus's thunder bolts and zaps Jerry's balls as part of her morning routine.
MB:  Damn.  What does she do if she wakes up in a bad mood?
Goddess:  You don't want to know, but it involves Poseidon's trident and Jerry's ass.
MB:  I get the gist.  Just curious, do y'all have anything in mind for Fred Phelps when he croaks?
Goddess:  Oh, yes.  While it is not our nature to get involved with matters in your realm, that doesn't mean that we don't occasionally express disapproval.  Most humans just go through their day to day lives getting through to the next day and don't really bother anyone.  If they bother anyone at all, it's harmless natterfly type stuff.  However, there are people who thrive on causing harm.  The gods of justice cannot let that go unchecked - it's not their nature.  They tend to let their punishments fit the crimes, and they're quite creative.  When Fred gets here, he will have to watch gay men have sex all day and all night.
MB:  That's not punishment!  That old fucker's a closet queen and he'll get off on it.
Goddess:  Ah, but here's where the creativity comes in.  Fred's hands will be bound so that he can't jack off.  He has to suffer with the world's worst case of blue balls.
MB:  Tantalus.  Diggin' it. Anyway, how long do I stay here before I go back to the human realm.
Goddess:  You go back when you wake up.  This has all been a dream.  You've suffered a terrible loss recently and your subconscious mind desperately wants there to be a peaceful afterlife.  This is a perfectly normal reaction.  Nobody wants to say goodbye to their loved ones - human or animal; but you'll wake up and you'll move on, just as you always have. 

The alarm clock goes off.  I wake up, hit the snooze, and spend the next five minutes thinking Papa Moonbat and I are due for a picnic and feed the ducks date.