It’s a Pinocchio thing. Bad things happen, and then worse things happen, and it is all because you act detestably and have no remorse. In Collodi’s version of karma, you have to eventually die to make amends for your life of being rude, stupid, and bad. There is no redemption for the wicked… not even the slightly wicked… even if you’re made of wood.
The blue boy inside the whale in the first Paffooney of this post is a Nebulon, meaning he lives inside a gargantuan space whale. The Nebulons use living creatures for technology and space whales as starships contain entire functioning ecosystems on their insides, living mainly off the sunlight of the suns they visit and the various gases of the living things they shelter inside themselves. So, being inside a whale changes their relationship to the universe, but they don’t necessarily suffer the bad karma of a wooden-headed child like Pinocchio. Still, stuck inside a whale for life. No redemption. No return on penitence.
I am obsessing about space in these Paffooneys because my stupid head is generating another CIssy Moonskipper story.
My own personal time in the belly of a whale began when my wife destroyed her car by impaling the grill in the front of the car on the trailer hitch of a quick-stopping truck in front of her. Then we had a tornado twist its way overhead and damage every tree in the neighborhood and a few of the houses as well. My wife and daughter went then on a planned vacation to the Virgin Islands leaving me at home with the dog who is dying of doggy breast cancer. Then belated complications caused the electricity to go out for the better part of four straight days. During that time I had an accident in my own car as well. Bummer. Bad is followed by worse… and then terrible.
I am still alive at this point in time. And the dog is still alive… though definitely dying. But of course, there is more badness to come. The dog is dying… and I probably am too. And Donald Trump seems to be winning the presidency again. Global warming is going to try to kill us again this summer. And MAGA Republicans will probably kill us all in the fall whether they win the election or not. The world is ending. In the belly of a whale. And we must pray for the Disney version where Pinocchio becomes a real boy.
I guess I never realized I was quite so rude and stupid and bad.
Catch a Falling Star 