I suppose I started my fascination of Life at a very early age, when I nearly lost it to a Near Death Experience at the age of three. It was one of those memories that stick with you from childhood, and growing up I thought everyone went through it. People who feared death, calling it "the end" confused me.

And I confused them, cause even after my grandparents and aunts and uncles left this world, I never felt the same sort of loss that other in my family did. In fact I was always wondering what they were up to; were they still in the room? Did they go off to that wonderful place I did? In a funny sort of way, I was even a little bit jealous.

The NDE had a rather strange effect on my childhood. Growing up, it was like being in a party the whole time. You know, when there's all this noise and you have to tune out all the noise just to keep up with the conversation. Again, I just got used to it and thought that everyone heard the voices. Now sure, some might attribute this to some slight case of schizophrenia but this was different. These voices weren't telling me to go off and shoot somebody, or that the aliens were coming to take over the planet; instead they were telling me about the nature of the atom and about life in two dimensions, rather than three.

Then, there were the nights I spent in "The Library" ... a wonderous place filled with books as far as the eye could see ... and there were wonderful teachers there. Each morning I would wake up with their lessons still echoing in my ear.