I’ve long imagined things in ways that turn out to be foreign to most places. I see people in that lens. I write stories with that environment in mind. I paint and draw as if that world were real and I were creating expressions of it.

Thinking that my view was common and the norm I was surprised that when I would explain or express my love of certain themes, what people decided I was actually talking about and the reality were worlds apart.

Finally figured out why.

Enter now a place I’ve been developing for my stories since about 2009 when I drew the first map of what I call Chichiyaboo on a whiteboard in my kitchen. It’s a place that would be familiar, I hope, to the people of the city of Enoch who were taken from the earth prior to the flood.

Chichiyaboo is a place without lying, stealing, violence, abuse, perversion, class differences, poverty, murder, and crime in general. The people are happy and free from war, mayhem, oppression, and the social ills that collect around evil.

Some will surely brush this sort of place off as an impossible utopia, but we are promised that in the next world people will live forever but will be separated as to the degree of happiness they are willing to enjoy. One would think that everyone would want all the happiness they can get, but it doesn’t take long to see examples of people who refuse it to one degree or another in favor of other acquisitions. They demand the outcome of happiness, but reject the requirements to achieve it. Others are finding their way, so things work in the end. The object is to get everyone the greatest degree of joy that they can abide in the current world and the one to come. As you can see, on this world discord is plentiful. It doesn’t have to be. There have been places and times and there will be worlds where safety, joy, love, and peace abound for those who wouldn’t have it any other way.

For those who prefer less, there are appropriate accomodations. Of necessity, these groups are not kept together in the permanent worlds that lie ahead.

Chichiyaboo is a place where people have no lasting predilection for evil. They’re good people, but still mortal.

On this world, even a place where people are free from the really ugly ills of a corrupt society there are challenges and growing experiences. Tears are shed, but overall they are happy people.

That land is where my head is at when I paint and draw and write stories. When I meet new friends, I assume they’re good people until I learn otherwise. It’s part of the joy of drawing portraits and interacting with good people. One sees a bit of heaven in them.

Here’s the present state of the map of Chichiyaboo. Pronounce it with short chi short chi then a slightly elevated ya then boo.