Can't Wait to Get to Heaven

A Heavenly Walk

As Ida and Elner walked along, it was very quiet, not a soul around, just the sound of birds.

When Elner asked her where they were going, Ida said, “You’ll see soon enough.”

Elner looked up and saw two zebras, with red stripes that looked like candy canes and with silver tinsel manes and tails, and a herd of tiny little bright yellow hippopotamuses no bigger than twelve inches high, pass right in front of them.

“That’s different,” Elner said. “You don’t see that every day.”

“You do here,” said Ida.

After they had walked a little while longer, Elner asked, “Are we there yet?”

Ida ignored her.

“How much farther do we have to go?”

“Just hold your horses, Elner, we’ll get there when we get there.”

“All right. I just wondered…that’s all.”

They continued on for a few more minutes, and as they turned a corner and Elner looked around, she suddenly realized they were walking down a street that looked exactly like First Avenue North; as she went farther and recognized the Goodnight house, she knew for sure it was First Avenue North. She was back on her own street all right, but something was odd. There were streetcar tracks running down the middle of the avenue and there had not been streetcars in Elmwood Springs for years; not only that, the large row of elm trees that used to line both sides of the street, that had been chopped down in the fifties, were suddenly right back where they used to be. When they walked past Ruby’s house, it had not changed much, but when they walked past her own house, she noticed that the fig tree in the side yard was only three feet tall. Elner said, “Ida, I don’t know what we’re doing here, but we’re not in the right time period, I can tell you that. We must have flipped back fifty years.”

“At least,” said Ida, looking up at the trees and continuing on down the street. Although she couldn’t figure out why she was back home again, Elner did not mind being back in time. It was really very, very pleasant, and so so quiet. All the new housing developments were gone, and the cornfields that used to be behind all the houses were back again. Then Elner saw several big fat squirrels running up and down the trees, only these squirrels were bright orange with white polka dots. “Look, Ida, wouldn’t Sonny just love to catch one of them.” Then something dawned on her. “Wait a minute, Ida, if we’re back fifty years ago, poor old Sonny isn’t even born yet, is he? And why are we flipped back? Am I going to get younger too?”

“Just wait, you’ll see,” she said.

Ida walked her all the way down to the end of the avenue, but instead of the little Shop & Go market the Vietnamese couple ran now, the old Smith house was there where it used to be, looking exactly as it had so many years ago, with the green and white awnings, and the big radio tower with the red light at the top still stood in the backyard. Ida stopped right in front of the house and announced, “Here we are!”

Elner was surprised. “Is this where we’re going? Neighbor Dorothy’s old house?”

“It is indeed. Come on,” she said.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Elner said, and happily followed her up the sidewalk. Elner was very pleased about this development. She would love to see the old house again. For years Dorothy Smith had broadcast Elner’s favorite radio show from that very house. In fact, the Neighbor Dorothy Show had been broadcast from Dorothy’s living room. Elner had listened to that show every day for all of the thirty-eight years it had been on the air. Dorothy had given out recipes and household hints and had even given away unwanted pets on the show. When Elner heard Dorothy describing a little orange kitten that needed a home, she had made her husband, Will, drive her into town and get it. She had even named it Sonny, in honor of the show’s theme song, “On the Sunny Side of the Street.” Standing there, Elner could still remember the song and the announcer’s voice that had introduced Neighbor Dorothy every morning. “And now, from that little white house just around the corner from wherever you are, here she is, the lady with the smile in her voice, your neighbor and mine…Neighbor Dorothy.”

Ida led Elner up the stairs to the front porch, and everything looked just the same, with the swing on one end of the porch and another swing on the other, and on the window to the right of the door, painted in small black and gold letters, was WDOT RADIO NO. 66 ON YOUR DIAL. Ida opened the front screen door and stepped back and indicated for Elner to step in, then said, “See you later, have fun” and turned to leave. “Wait,” said Elner. “Where are you going? Am I going to see you again?”

Ida waved over her shoulder at her as she headed back down the stairs.

“Just go on in, Elner,” she said as she disappeared around the corner.

Elner was a little nervous at being left alone. She wasn’t sure what to expect next, this had been such a crazy trip, but the minute she opened the door and poked her head inside the house, it still had the same old familiar smell she remembered; Neighbor Dorothy’s house always smelled as if there were something sweet baking in the oven, and usually there was. When she stepped inside the front hall, she got the surprise of her life. Princess Mary Margaret, Dorothy’s old cocker spaniel, came running to greet her, and over in the corner, there sat her old friend, Neighbor Dorothy! She had died almost forty-eight years before, but here she was, looking exactly like herself, sitting in her favorite floral chair with that same sweet open round face smiling at Elner, as big as you please, with the same old twinkle in her eye.

“Hello there, Elner,” she said. “I’ve been waiting for you!”

If Elner hadn’t believed it was her, she would have recognized that voice anywhere.

“Well, it is you!”

“Yes, it’s me!” said Dorothy, clapping her hands in delight. “Surprised?”

“Just as surprised as I can be.”

After they had hugged, Elner said, “Oh my heavens. Ida never told me a thing, I had no idea I’d be seeing you again. Let me just sit down and look at you.” She went over to the chair across from Dorothy’s and just stared at her, shaking her head in amazement.

“Well…if you are not a sight for sore eyes, I don’t know who is. For land’s sake, how are you?”

“Oh, just wonderful, Elner, and how are you?”

Elner shook her head and laughed. “Honey, to tell you the truth, at this point I have no idea. Evidently I’m dead, but I haven’t the slightest idea what is going on. All Ida told me was that I was going to meet my Maker. Am I in the right place?”

Dorothy smiled. “You are indeed, and you don’t know how happy I am to see you, Elner.”

“Me too, it’s been too long, and you look great.”

“Thank you, Elner. So do you.”

“Oh well,” she laughed. “I’ve gained a few pounds since I last saw you, but I feel fine…except I just fell out of my fig tree, that’s why I’m in this old robe, I hadn’t even gotten dressed for the day yet.”

“I know,” said Dorothy sympathetically. “You took a bad fall.”

“I did, didn’t I? But I don’t think I broke anything. Nothing hurts so far.”

“Good, we don’t want any broken bones.”

Elner sat back in her chair, crossed her feet, and looked around the room and noticed Dorothy’s two yellow canary birds, Dumpling and Moe, were as fat as ever and still chirping away in their cage, and the milk-glass chandelier still hung over the dining room table, with the floral swag curtains. “The place looks just the same. I always loved your house, Dorothy.”

“I know you did.”

“And I loved your show too, everybody missed you so much when you went off the air. There’s never been a better show than yours. Now they have Bud and Jay on in the morning, and they’re pretty good, but they don’t give out recipes like you used to.”

“No, those were the good old days….”

Elner looked around and said, “I smell something good, you don’t just happen to have a cake in the oven, do you?”

“I do,” said Dorothy. “A caramel cake, and as soon as it is done, you and I are going to have some.”

“Oh boy, caramel cake, my favorite.”

“I know, I remembered.”

“So,” said Elner, very happy at the thought of the upcoming cake, “am I in some sort of a holding pattern, resting up, having a little snack, before I go on to my final destination?”

Dorothy smiled and said, “No, honey, this is it.”

“It is?” said a surprised Elner. “Now I’m all confused…. Are you the one I’m supposed to see? You’re not the Maker, are you?”

Dorothy laughed. “Yes, one of them, at least, there are actually two of us, but I wanted a chance to say hello to you first, before we went in for our meeting. You were always one of my favorite people. I always got the biggest kick out of you, always asking those crazy questions.”

“Well, thank you,” she said. “You were always one of mine, but…I always thought you were just a regular person, it never occurred to me that you were anything other than just my friend, now I’m just mortified…I never dreamed you were…well, who you are. Will that count against me?”

Dorothy shook her head. “No, and you have no need to be mortified over anything.”

“I don’t?”

“No, the Dorothy Smith that you knew was the real Dorothy Smith, I’m just speaking to you in her likeness, sort of a look-alike. We always like to use a familiar form, one you would feel comfortable with: we certainly don’t want to scare anybody. You’re not scared, are you?”

“No, just a little confused. You say you look like her, but you’re not really Neighbor Dorothy?”

“That’s right, but in a way I am. There’s a little part of us in everybody.”

Elner tried her best to figure it out. “Oh dear, I think I’m still confused, who’s ‘us’? Ida told me I was going to meet my Maker, and if you’re not you, then who’s that dog over there? Is that Princess Mary Margaret, or just an imposter pretending to be her?”

Dorothy laughed. “I promise you, it’s not all that complicated. Just wait, you’ll see, the whole thing is really very simple. Come on with me, honey, I have someone I want you to meet.”