Maybe I wear too much black. Maybe I sketch too many skulls or obsess over E.A. Poe and Morrissey. Or maybe I'm just in a spiritual cul-de-sac right now, looking for double chocolate relevance in a vanilla circumstance.

Whether it's deliberate distraction or accidental osmosis, I find myself learning more than I ever cared to know about the characters that make up the animated films of Walt Disney. I've learned Sleeping Beauty’s real name (Aurora) and which prince goes with which princess. Splinters of trivia stick in my memory and refuse to dislodge.

“Where’s the bathroom?” a guest asked me one day.

“Just up ahead on your right,” I said, pointing naturally with two fingers. “Just past the Tree of Life, where you’ll be interested to know there are 325 animals carved into the trunk and branches.”

I cautiously watch The Eyes And Ears for reports of a Guest passing at one of the parks, but that news never comes. Disney World remains immune.

About a month ago, I began researching death, bookmarking web pages that outlined the possibilities of immortality: Taoist sites with hopeful messages of reincarnation, discussion boards about stem cell research and nanotechnology, dark magic. I've spent entire nights researching cryonics, the historically disastrous “science” of freezing a body into a state of suspended animation, which, ironically, supposedly attracted Walt Disney (There's an amazing story on This American Life about Bob Nelson, the first President of the Cryonics Institute).

These days, I'm seeing death from a philosophical angle, not as a final state of rest, but as a transition that relies on tangential factors like technology and privilege and faith. Each reference to eternal life lights a fresh spark of hope in the caverns of my mind, and I cling to these hopes to fight off the demons.