Can’t Wait to Get to Heaven

We Michigan folks should be especially proud of Thomas Edison, for he lived in Port Huron for most of his childhood. His parents were buried there, and there is a most impressive monument for him on the St. Clair River as well as a beautiful, large fountain in Detroit and an institute named after him in Dearborn.

I was reminded of him when I read Fannie Flagg’s enjoyable book, “Can’t Wait to Get to Heaven.” Her heroine, Elner Shimfissle, admired Edison tremendously, hanging a magazine picture of him on her kitchen wall and personally celebrating his birthday, February 11, 1847, by turning on all of her electrical appliances at once and leaving them on all day long.

One of her life-long regrets was that she never got to meet Thomas Edison. ”I just hate to think we were on the earth at the same time and I never got to shake his hand and thank him,” she said. “Just think, without old Tom Edison, we would all still be sitting in the dark, no lights, no radio, no electric garage door openers. I think, after the Lord, of course, I’d rank the Wizard of Menlo Park number two.”

It’s interesting that when Edison left Michigan and moved to Menlo Park, New Jersey, in 1876, he was young and still unknown. During his first six years there, however, he patented approximately 400 inventions, including the phonograph, devices for electric light and power and  the motion picture camera or "Kinetograph.”

He was an outgoing fellow who was extremely proud of his invention of electric lights, saying, "We will make electricity so cheap that only the rich will burn candles."

True enough, as Fannie Flagg points out in her novel, we don’t have a national holiday for Edison, but he has certainly been memorialized in this country. Towns, colleges, high schools, lakes, bridges, hotels, museums and an asteroid in space have been named after him, and there are even two Navy ships carrying his name.

Though “Can’t Wait to Get to Heaven” is mostly quite believable, Elner, unlike any other human being we’ve ever heard of, actually dies and goes to heaven for a short time. While she is there, she even gets to meet her hero, Thomas Edison. He not only appears but he interrupts the God figure, saying to Elner, “Just wanted to say a quick hello, and thank you for all your good wishes and support over the years.”

Not a shy lady, Elner responds immediately by complimenting him, saying, “Just imagine how much company you have given to all the shut-ins and so forth, people don’t have to be all alone anymore.“

After her time in Heaven, she comes back to earth for a last visit. Then Elner dies again, this time permanently, near the end of the book. Going back up to heaven, she is thrilled to meet up with not only her deceased husband and relatives but also with Thomas Edison, who is again delighted to see her.

Flagg is most famous for “Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe,” for which she won an Academy Award and a Writers Guild of America Award, but “Can’t Wait to Get to Heaven” is a delightful book, as well. Elner is a delightful, unselfish, loving character, a fine model for us all. I was especially pleased to be reminded of one of our finest Michigan heroes, Thomas Edison.