Q. What is limbo?
A. Limbo is a state where the recently gone go when the lines at heaven, hell and purgatory are backed up more than a mile. Think of it as spiritual overflow parking.

Q. So which state is it? North Dakota?
A. Limbo isn’t a real state like those with indicted and/or imprisoned governors, or a governor who thinks global warming is a communist plot and tells critics “If there’s global warming how come there are no beaches in Antarctica? ‘Splain that Vladimir.”

Q. Is limbo like a city?
A. Limbo is like a giant flea market. You spend hours wandering the aisles, never finding anything that snaps your sheets. You’re vaguely looking for a belt buckle that says Baltimore Catechism, or an out of print book of magic tricks by Bullwinkle J. Moose.

You find yourself in front of a black velvet painting of the Young Elvis firing a gun into a television set in a Las Vegas hotel. You feel an overwhelming need not to be there anymore.

A clerk, asks “What are you looking for?” You say “Do you have any Bullwinkle magic books?” The clerk points to a far corner, perhaps a mile distant. “Bullwinkle that-a-way,” he says. “Next to the Baltimore Catechism belt buckles.”

You set off. Four days later you’re back in front of Elvis shooting the TV. You feel an overwhelming need not to be in this place anymore. A clerk asks “What are you looking for?” You say “The Exit.” He points to a corner, perhaps a mile away. “Behind Bullwinkle. Next to the Baltimore Catechism belt buckles. You can’t miss it.”

But you can and do. And do. And doodle-y do.

Eventually you buy the Elvis painting. The vendor, vaguely familiar, hands it to you, saying “Thank you. Thank you, very much.”

Now you’re wandering the aisles with an Elvis painting under your arm. You take a closer look at it and you begin to wonder. That young vendor guy…

Q. My grandmother says limbo is a dance invented by Chubby Checker.
A. There was a schism in those days. Some believed Limbo was a place but others, like Mr. Checker, believed it was a dance. Some reasoned it could be both—a place for dancing. Others, unable to define, pronounce or spell schism, asked for a new question.

Q. So, if you’re good you go to Heaven. If you’re bad you go to Hell. If you were kind of good and kind of bad you end up in Purgatory until O.J.’s lawyer can see you. So who’s in Limbo?
A. According to Chubby, it’s where Jack B. Nimble and Jack B. Quick hang. BTW: they’re the only two dudes who know how to “jump under limbo stick.” That’s important, because getting out of Limbo all depends on your answer to the question “How low can you go?” And speaking of low, did I mention? It’s also, where O.J’s* lawyer lives.

*For those too young to know who O.J. is, Google “running through airports,” “ex-football players who murdered
and got away with it,” and “dumb as a box of hula hoops.”**

**For those too young to know what a hula hoop is, Google “plastic hoop spun around the waist for no apparent reason,” and “Ex-football players with the I.Q. of a box of big plastic zeroes.”***

***For those too young to know what Google is, that’s really young. Please do not neglect your studies.

©Patrick A. McGuire and A Hint of Light 2013-2014, all rights reserved.