QUESTION:

Who's at your imaginary dinner table?

Various versions of this pop up in quizzes. Though I've come across this question, I've never really given it further thought. Now seems a good time?

Who's at my table? Well, the logistics alone - I'm vegan remember - would be my first hurdle. Can't very well have King Arthur slobbering all over my greens with his chunks of meat! I get grossed out when I am cooking steak for the boys and some fat spatters on my face. Mad rush to wipe- especially around the mouth area.

Food taken care of... I'd chose Nietzsche first (Wow... took me 40 years to finally spell his name without a single error!)  His mind (misogynist leanings aside) enthrals me. I can read his books over and over (and I do) and discover new, fresh interpretations within them. To sit alongside and hear him expound on philosophy and the arts and the idea of Superman - not the caped version, the Man as God version - ooohhh!

Hmmm... next? Maybe Jesus. If God's son (or a Great Philosopher... or a brilliant story-teller) really did walk the streets of old Jerusalem... I'd love to hear his story. Unadulterated by the writings and perspectives of others and all the necessary fidgeting through the centuries since-to keep his (?) works relevant. (I have a set of questions ready if he really is the Son of God. Like what's the story with war, disease, famine and the killing of little children?)

Definitely Cohen- the present-day Leonard. Only because I first heard his songs the day he died, and I have a lot of questions. Who the hell was his publicist, for starters? I ask around my circle of people and no one knows him. How is this possible? I also want to ask him... what cost a lifetime of induced separations from love? (We have that in common.)

Perhaps Ayn Rand. She's been on my mind recent days only because of a show called Mad Men. I've been binge-watching it and the lead character is very, very Atlas Shrugged. I even dug the book out. Read through all the underlined bits from a couple of decades ago. Damn. Still relevant today. I want to pick her brain. I want to know how she conceived him.

Richard Burton Matheson. You probably don't know him. I owe him. If his female character had been called another name, my life today may have been... very different. I'd not know him, for instance, because my name would have been lost in a sea of others. And there would not be so many words on here and elsewhere. But Richard also owes me an explanation: How the fuck did he create a story in 1980 that parallels me and mine today so... intimately? How?

That's six of us. Enough, I think. I expect a noisy table and much gesticulating. Also, maybe... a miracle or two.

Who sits at your table?