5 people you would want to spend some time with, a weekend get away!

I saw this question on FB someplace where someone had asked what five people you would like to have come to a dinner party.  I thought, cool who would Mr. Oatmeal pick for that sort of thing.  I immediately went for Jesus, Muhammad and the Buddha but then I got to wondering, maybe those folks were not as popular and famous in their lifetimes as they are now.  Maybe they did not understand the impact of their lives so far into the future.  Maybe they were just normal guys that were just doing the right thing and some folks started following them.  I can’t imagine any of them had any idea what would come of their lives and the work they started.  I suppose that could be said about most figures we know from history, ancient or recent.  So, that lead me to start thinking about folks who at least seemed interesting or that I thought might be interesting in their own right.      
 

It has taken me a bit of pondering, there are so many that would be interesting to spend time with, at least in my opinion.

So here ya go.

Leonardo da Vinci – here was a man truly out of time, he was not of his age and if I believed – I say that he traveled back in time from some point in our not so distant future.   He was a genius in many areas as well – he was an inventor, engineer, architect, anatomist, scientist and philosopher.  He was a left brain kind of guy for sure.  BUT…………… He was also equally a right brainer - known for being a painter, musician, sculptor, architect, cartographer and writer.   Who else would have been able to conjure and create the famous “Mona Lisa” and the even more famous “The Last Supper”?   He is the quintessential definition of a Renaissance man.  He wrote the bulk of his notes backwards and in code, why?  What was he hiding or was he just messing with people heads, maybe he was also a comedian.  This is a man who snuck into graveyards at night to steal corpses and study human anatomy, to find out where the soul was.  I find him a complete and total dichotomy of his time.  I would love to have him spend some time on our age and then come to my weekend getaway.  I think it would be fascinating to get his “take on things” in today’s world.  Mostly I could just ask questions, I would be the annoying kid going why? why? why? 

Bill gates – I think he would be interesting not for what made him rich and famous but what he has done after he got rich and famous.   Here is a guy who can make an impact on world issues like no one has ever been able to do before him.  Think about the impact that $28,000,000,000 (28 Billion) dollars has had on our planet!  The Bill and Melinda Gates foundation has been working on some of the planets worst problems.  Problems most isolated Americans do not even know exist.  He has probably singlehandedly saved more lives than anyone in history with The Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization program alone, and that is one of thousands of initiatives they are working on.  I would love to get to know someone who has that grand of a vision, someone who has the ability to make that big of difference in so many lives.  From simple means this man has taken on the hardest problems on the planet, it easily makes building the most deployed operating system seem completely insignificant by comparison.  I would love to understand how he went from smart kid, to business tycoon to the world’s greatest philanthropist in one lifetime.         

Constantine the first – Like it or not, this is the person responsible for the popularization of the Christian religion.   Christianity was still a rag tag group of misfits when he became the Emperor or Rome.  It is well known that he was the first Roman emperor to convert to Christianity, in 313 he and CoEmperor Licinius issued the Edit of Milan in which tolerance of all religions was proclaimed.   Most importantly he was a Roman and what were the Romans great at, organizing things.  They organized, armies, organizing empires, the organized building projects like no others and they (he) organized Christianity.  I would love to talk to him about how he selected the books of the Bible, what criteria was used for Mark getting in and the Odes of Solomon not getting in.  Did he envision what Roman Catholicism is today or did he envision something completely different?  What was it about the epistle of Barnabas that got it kicked out and what about John got that book in?  Could it have been John 3:16, which is, in my opinion, the key to the whole thing.  If you believe that God gave his only begotten son so that whichever of us believes in him will have eternal life.  It seems to me that if you believe that, you are in and if you don’t, there is no way you can get in.  From an organizational perspective I think it would be interesting to find out the why on how the Bible was assembled.  Why did the Old testament have an angry plague and pestilence God while the and the New Testament has a healing, forgiving and loving God – I think it was to make it all work, hard to sell the old testament.   

Mark Twain – I have always looked at Mark Twain as a quintessential American.  He was someone who had his finger on the pulse of America.  He also changed the way people wrote, before him writing was very formal.  When he came along he was able to inject a certain type of colloquialism writing (for lack of better words).  His Prince and the Pauper is a classic and A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court I think showed the absurdities of political and societal norms, in Yankee by setting it in the court of King Arthur – how funny is that.  More than anything there was an everyman sort of down to earth common sense that came through in his writing, more so in the newspaper articles than his books I think though.  I would love for him to spend a year in our time and then come to my weekend getaway, he would no doubt be able to point out the absurdities of our day that surround and envelope us in a way that we do not even notice anymore.  He would be telling us about the elephant in the room, of that I have ZERO doubt! 

Michael Angelo – I have stared at the ceiling in the Sistine Chapel and I have seen his Pietà, the sculpture he created when he was only 24 years old that depicts Mary holding Jesus after he was crucified.  It is probably the most moving piece of art I have ever laid eyes on.   He had many many famous commissions over his life but those two for me are the most incredible.  I feel they are incredible because they both moved me like no other art I had seen before or since.  I would love to ask him how he saw those things, how did he see Mary holding Jesus after his death inside that block of marble.  How did he see that incredible story he put on the ceiling before he got started.  My questions would not be about the magnificence of the work, which is unquestioned, but more about how did he see it, what inspired him and how was he able to take that vision and drive it through to completion.   For him, he just had a job, he was an artist doing his work.  There is absolutely no way that he could have known the impact of his work on the rest of the world.  If one were to have told Michael Angleo that in less than one year in 2010 over 500 million people were going to come to see his work he would have thought you crazy.  That was population of the planet when he was alive.  The first I ever heard of the Sistine Chapel was in the movie Ecstasy and agony, with Charlton Heston, and Rex Harrison.  I remember the part where Pope Julius II (Rex Harrison) would constantly holler up to Michael Angelo on the scaffolding, “when will it be done”, and Michael Angelo (Charlton Heston) would yell down “when I am finished”.  I loved that movie. 

 

As I was pondering this blog and started writing it, I listened to a song called “Beer With Jesus” by Thomas Rhett, here are the lyrics and below that is a link to the video.

If I could have a beer with Jesus heaven knows I'd sip it nice and slow.  I'd try to pick a place that ain't too crowded or gladly go wherever he wants to go.  You can bet I'd order up a couple tall ones, tell the waitress put 'em on my tab.   I'd be sure to let him do the talkin', careful when I got the chance to ask how'd you turn the other cheek?  To save a sorry soul like me, do you hear the prayers I send.  What happens when life ends, and when you think you're comin' back again.  I'd tell everyone, but no one would believe it.  If I could have a beer with Jesus, If I could have a beer with Jesus I'd put my whole paycheck in that jukebox.  Fill it up with nothing but the good stuff, sit somewhere we couldn't see a clock.  Ask him how'd you turn the other cheek, to save a sorry soul like me.  Have you been there from the start, how'd you change a sinner's heart.  And is heaven really just beyond the stars.  I'd tell everyone, but no one would believe it.  If I could have a beer with Jesus, he can probably only stay, for just a couple rounds.  But I hope and pray he's stayin' till we shut the whole place down.  Ask him how'd you turn the other cheek to save a sorry soul like me.  What's on the other side?  Is mom and daddy alright?  And if it ain't no trouble tell them I said hi.  I'd tell everyone but no one would believe it If I could have a beer with Jesus.  I'd tell everyone but no one would believe it, If I could have a beer with Jesus.  http://www.cmt.com/videos/thomas-rhett/855115/beer-with-jesus.jhtml.  I suppose I feel that way

 
There are so many characters in history that I think would be interesting to spend time with but I have narrowed my list to these five, what are your thoughts on it