Just as I’m sure it has for you a time or two, occasionally an odd thought occurs to me, possibly leaning more towards frequently than occasionally. But then who’s to say where the line delineating frequent from occasional lies, and who decides how frequent is too frequent? If such a thought is occasional, is it less odd than if it were frequent, or is odd just odd regardless of frequency?

Come to think of it, who decides if a thought is odd? I guess until it is expressed a thought will simply stay a thought and nobody but the thinker of that thought may think, “Well now, that’s an odd thought.” Is it better for odd thoughts to stay thoughts, or for them to be expressed, so family and friends can make informed decisions regarding their list of people to invite to Tupperware parties, camping trips, or axe throwing competitions?

Everyone has odd thoughts, of which the degree and frequency of such thoughts varies dependent upon genetics and age of first exposure to satellite television. I don’t have any data to back that up, but I have met my family, and when I was about 11 my grandparents got one of the first satellite dishes I had ever seen. I saw some odd stuff that I have unsuccessfully unseen. So it goes.

Have you ever been in a place with a lot of other people, perhaps a family gathering, a concert, a sporting event, a classroom, a restaurant? Not very odd is it? Happens all the time.

Have you ever glanced around at all those people and wondered who is going to be the last person here in this very place right now to die? Who is going to be the final keeper of the memory of what is happening right here, right now? The final keeper that heard the sounds, saw the faces, and felt the feeling of the moment.

I’ve never thought that either. “What an odd thing to think” I thought when I heard someone think such a thing.

The final keeper. There has to be one. There can only be one. Even on a bicycle built for two there has to be one. Chances are it’ll be the one in the back, as they will have the one in the front trying to steer and send a selfie to use as an airbag when they run headlong into an electric car they never heard coming.

Of course there has to be a first to go as well, and a second, a third, and so on and so forth until that final keeper taps out. Have you ever thought that it would be interesting to look around at a crowd and see the number of when each will go hovering over them? From one to the final keeper. Would you want to glance up and see which number was hovering over you? Odd…perhaps even.

I’ve asked a few people if they’ve ever contemplated this final keeper thought, and oddly enough, those very same people seem to have stopped hosting Tupperware parties, going camping, or entering axe throwing competitions.

Maybe odd thoughts should stay thoughts. But why shouldn’t others have the opportunity to engage in an odd thought too? How many people have to think a thought for it to stop being an odd thought?

For instance, forgetting your perfectly good fish soaking in lye until it becomes a gelatinous blob, and then thinking, “I wonder what that taste like?” “That’s an odd thought” said Njörd, the Norse god of the sea, as Njörd can hear all sea-like thoughts. “What do you think?” Njörd said to Audumla, to which the sacred cow replied, “Better the fish than me, but needs butter…lots and lots of butter.”

The final keeper…just a thought.