This book collects nine short works by inventor David Stein. He has urgent things to say about religion, trees, the atom bomb, Zen, Mom, the millennium, Montana, dreams, art, and the biggest bubble of al: THE HALO There was a child born on Horse Island with a halo, but nothing much came of it--- It was a honey-colored halo like the ones you see in old paintings, but smaller, only four inches across. Its glow was faint. It floated in the air slightly off the child's head... THE INVENTION OF GOD I often meet the devout and they often try to recruit me--- Recently I met a man walking his dog above town. He was a minister newly arrived at a steeple down below, and he invited me to join his bible study group. I had to decline. When he asked why, I said my views on religion were so strange they might wreck the faith of his other members... BOWING LESSONS Bow to a salt shaker. / Bow to the salt white and sloping / filling half the shaker. / Bow to a pepper shaker standing / alongside. / Bow to the sound of a volleyball / being punched across a net. / Bow to birdsongs, to the drone / of a plane / Bow to the voices of young women / flinging a frisbee across a lawn... MADLO: HOW DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY CAN RID THE WORLD OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS Remember the Cold War? Fear of incoming missiles? Fear of being vaporized by a monstrous ball of fire? Diving under your desk and waiting for the end?--- Well, the Cold War is still with us. Thousands of nuclear missiles still stand ready to fire. And Cold War theory is still with us. The truly mad theory of Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD)... AN ODE TO MOM Now that I'm educated / (it's a long long road I've come), / perhaps my pen is equal / to an ode upon my Mom, / an ample subject even / for a man of fifty-four, / encompassing such matters / as the Second World War, / the Crash, the Great Depression, / indeed all History, / for Mom was a professor--- / she was professoring to me / even on the ranch (Montana) / long before she ever taught / college in Spokane--- / but I've lost my train of thought... MILLENNIUM: 1999 2000 2001 2006 (December 27, 1999) / What to do about the millennium-- / I could keep a journal-- / For instance I could say / I saw a peregrine falcon yesterday / perched on a nest in Central Park. / And as I stared, strange women / gathered round and spoke to me. / "Is she feeding hatchlings?" / "No, how could she be, eggs don't hatch / in winter." "Oh." "Then she's tearing / at a squirrel." "I guess so." / Little sights and sounds like that. / A journal... GO GREEN BY GIVING TREES You can be carbon neutral for only $7.00 per year--- Your family, your business, your town, your state, can be carbon neutral for $7.00 per year, times the number of people involved--- The entire United States, every man, woman, and child, can be carbon neutral for 2.3 billion dollars per year--- Donate to trees.org. Fund and grow it globally... TOUGH TRIP THROUGH PARADISE: THE MOVIE If a roughneck arms peddler rode in telling three different stories how his wife died in the wilderness, a good detective might suspect foul play and start asking questions--- The suspect is Andrew Garcia, author of the Montana classic Tough Trip Through Paradise, edited by my late father, Ben Stein. Mysteriously, for forty years, Ben kept Garcia's original manuscripts secret... 5 DREAMS OF CHRIST I dreamed that I was (wingless) Christ returning, I was gliding in slow motion down to crowded lawns and avenues of a spacious landscape garden-- I was sky high at first (I thought the people might be cabbages or goats)-- I was shocked, amazed to be the Christ, full of good intentions, eagerly looking forward to humanity's surprise and joy at my return--