When your ultimate vision of Heaven lit*er*al*ly involves a cloned Jason Statham

Truth Serum Tell #21

In a post in April 2024,

Alisa Kennedy Jones

over at gotham girl had a Thursday Thread that posed the question, “What's your ultimate vision of heaven?”

Thursday Thread: Dearest Reader, What's your ultimate vision of heaven?

As someone who was preparing to die in my early 20s, I’d thought about this question a lot.

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Welcome to Lit*er*al*ly, Ororo, a blog by me, Ororo Munroe. You are reading Truth Serum Tells, posts about deeper life shit. No needles or toxic, mind-bending drugs were used to write these posts.

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In my early 20s, I was going clubbing and checking out a local male revue nearly every weekend. I honestly don’t remember when the headaches started, but it would be a typical headache that would eventually go away with aspirin.

Until they didn’t.

Over time, the headaches would become more frequent, and I figured these were no longer headaches, but migraines. It would start with a prickle at the back my neck and move over the top of my head like a tidal wave, before settling, icepick-like, behind an eyeball. I would eventually be prescribed migraine medicine. <cue the dark rooms and arctic blasts to the face. Which kinda sucked, because I’m cold by nature>

Soon, not only would they become more frequent, but more intense. I would become disoriented, slur my words like I was drunk, and blacking out. And all this without drinking a drop of alcohol. When I blacked out while visiting my parents, they were like, “You’re going to get a second opinion about these migraines.”

I should’ve done that when the migraine medicine had been prescribed, because if I had, I would’ve discovered the aneurysm sooner. The one the size of a cherry tomato clinging to my brain stem like an alien symbiot (minus the big teeth, long tongue, and propensity to eat people). I didn’t know then, what I know now: that POC are treated like the nappy-haired stepchild when it comes to the healthcare system in the U.S.

As you know, the brain is a fragile organ to begin with, but when you’re dealing with the stem, well… I could practically see the doctor rubbing his hands in excitement in hopes of getting to work on me because it was a procedure that wasn’t done very often. Surgery was an option, but my recovery rate would be less than acceptable---to me. I guess they thought being a vegetable and a medical burden to my parents for whatever life I had left was better than dead.

To which I said

So, I toughed it out.

I was given extra strong drugs to battle the pain and learned to head <no pun intended> off the pain before it got too crazy.

I sat down with my family and told them that I was basically a ticking time bomb. I told them, “If I start doing X, then you need to do Y.”

I sat down with my lifelong BFF and told her that I was basically a ticking time bomb. I told her, “If I start doing X, then you need to do Y.”

I had an hours long conversation with my long-distance, lifelong BFF and told him that I was basically a ticking time bomb. I really wish I’d been able to tell him in person, to hold his hand, to hug him tightly, because I’ll never, as long as I live, forget the sound he made when I explained what was going on. Coming from a man in general, but him specifically, was truly heartbreaking.

My emotions were all over the place as I came to terms with the fact that I was dying. I would have intermittent crying jags because Lordty, I didn’t want to intentionally bring on a headache. Every day was a crapshoot of whether I was going to wake up and live another day. When I did, like Ice Cube said, “Today was a good day.” Family and friends called me daily to make sure, too.

I didn’t want to die. I mean, really, who wants to die before you’ve done what you wanted to do? I had a Bucket List of places I wanted to visit, I wanted to continue writing and traditionally publish my YA books…

But death is inevitable. Elton John was right; it’s the Circle of Life. And I was scared for the longest time.

Until I wasn’t.

I remember saying the words out loud one day. “I’m dying.”

I no longer felt that stabbing pang in my heart.

I no longer felt the ball of dread in my stomach.

Peace was made.

I felt strangely calm and thought, “I’m just going to live my life the best I can.”

Back then, I didn’t understand how wills worked, but I wanted to be prepared. For everyone else. So, I just wrote down my preferences:

· The outfit to be buried in

· The music playlist

· Where I wanted to be buried

· How I wanted to be buried

· Who I wanted at my funeral service

· And kind words said were not expected, but appreciated

Being the writer that I was, I also wrote a letter to each family member (Mom, Dad, Sis) and my two besties. I put the list in an envelope, put the letters in envelopes, rubber banded them together and put them in a safety deposit box.

I know what you’re thinking…

HOW THE FUCK LONG DID SHE LIVE LIKE THIS?

One year.

One whole year of migraines, with blackouts sprinkled in for shits and giggles.

One whole year of monthly MRIs to check the growth.

One whole year of worried daily phone call check-ins from close friends and family.

One whole year of kill-me-nows and stab-me-with-a-fork-I’m-dones.

One whole year of second-guessing and wondering if I should’ve gone through with that surgery because maybe being a vegetable and a medical burden on my family for the rest of whatever life I have left is better than ALL. THIS. FUCKING. PAIN.

That Ice Cube song was becoming a daily mantra for me. Just kidding. Not really. I’m not a particular fan of that kind of rap, but thinking back on it now, that song really could’ve been something to live by.

I am not a religious person. I was baptized as Catholic when we lived in Reno. Sis and I went to a Catholic school (fucking hated it, two snaps down) and we went to church as a family every Sunday. We stopped going once we moved back to Arizona.

But I don’t consider myself Catholic and I haven’t gone to church in decades.

Do I believe there’s a higher power in the Universe?

Yes.

And it’s a female.

I prayed to her--in my own way--and as luck (or all that praying. Whatevs) would have it, I ended up in a clinical experimental drug trial program that dissolved the aneurysm over a period of six months.

I now must have annual MRIs for the rest of my life. And I can live with that.

I no longer have the safety deposit box (it’s now a Box of Important Papers (read: filing container) under my desk), but I still have the individual letters. The list of preferences has been updated into a real Will.

Back then, my ultimate vision of Heaven was probably some place tropical, where I could read romance books all day, write my stories, and have all my needs be catered to by a H-A-W-T as fuck book boyfriend.

When Alisa answered the question, part of her response was, “a beautiful, ramshackle house filled with all the books in the world.”

I agreed with her, to a certain extent.

Today, my ultimate vision of Heaven would be to live in the world’s first book town, Hay-on-Wye in Wales. Who’d want to live in a town with lit*er*al*ly two dozen bookstores? Um. Me. This certified book ‘ho right here 🙌🏽, in a little boho-designed cottage smack dab in a field of wildflowers where I can read romance books all day, write steamy short stories, and Netflix/Prime and Chill with a cloned Jason Statham.

I write short and steamy interracial romance novellas under the name Evolet Yvaine. If you like stories that will make your panties wet, I invite you to become a member of the Wet Panty Society and join me on my writing journey. It comes with perks! (in addition to other… perky things)