Steve was driving home after a long day at the office. It was rainy and cold outside but he was feeling very warm inside. He had just closed a seven-digit deal on a new product he was promoting: Some kind of gadget that you put across your eyes at night which induces lucid dreams. They call it 'Seventh Heaven.'
'Man, am I thirsty. I could sure go for a Big Gulp right now.' Steve said aloud. He spotted a 7-11 and pulled into the parking lot just as one of the lights flickered out on the sign. Locking the door to his car, he glanced up to see a giant red seven illuminated above his head. This brought a grin to his lips. 'Very cute.' He thought.
A few moments later he was at the checkout counter with his Big Gulp, a carton of milk, a dozen eggs, a bag of chips, a six-pack and the latest copy of Time magazine.
'That'll be seven dollars, sir.' Said the blond, sport jersey-clad college-kid check-out guy.
'You're kidding. You mean 6.99, right?' Steve asked unbelievingly.
'Uh, nope. Your bill came out to exactly seven dollars, sir.' he returned with a yawn.
This is quite an amazing coincidence, Steve mused as he paid the lad, gathered up his purchase and made his way to the exit.
"Sweet dreams!' The chap behind the counter yelled after him.
Steve, with one hand already pushing open the door, turned back to see the dude waving his hand, smiling, with a black number seven imprinted on his shirt…
Steve stepped outside expecting to be hit by the cold rain, but, to his astonishment, the sun was shining. A brilliant reflection off a large lake where the parking lot should have been forced him to shield his eyes with the paper bag of groceries.
'What the… Where am I?'
'Seventh Heaven, sir.'
Steve jumped in surprise, not expecting anyone to respond to his question. The owner of the voice behind him was none other than the counter person, except he was no longer wearing his college uniform. Rather, he was dressed in a long, shimmering, yellow robe, with tiny, silver sevens covering every square inch. On his left shoulder sat perched a brilliantly colored bird of a type Steve had never seen before. In his right hand he held a jar of what looked like sparkling earth.
'All right.' Steve said, dropping his bag, putting both hands on his hips. 'You got a lot of explaining to do. 'For starters, what's up with the number seven following me every where?'
'Three plus four!' Squawked the bird. 'Four plus three!'
'Very funny. No, come on, what's with the sevens?'
'One plus six! Six plus one!'
'Listen here you little stripling! I don't know what kind of game you're playing here, but I don't find it very amusing. I had a very long day and I'm not in the mood for mathematics.'
'What Sim-lev is telling you,' the boy began, referring to his feathered companion, 'is that this place is a combination of the third and fourth dimension, or, Space and Time. Most of our lives we dwell in one or the other, but rarely do we touch the place where they both meet.'
Steve felt the beginnings of a headache coming on. 'You're not making any sense.'
'Three symbolizes our daily physical routines. Get up in the morning, eat breakfast, go to work, come home, flip on the TV, etc., etc. The acts we play out on the three dimensional stage we live on. Not really going anywhere except closer to our graves. Then there's the guy who lives in the world of four; Namely, dreamland. Not bound by space, we project ourselves into the future or reflect on the events of the past, but we become disassociated and unproductively detached from our physical reality with all of its boundaries and restrictions which actually create a healthy structure. So the man living in either of these two worlds will end up dying of either boredom or frustration. But the fortunate one who learns to combine the two worlds lives a balanced life of physical creative activity which breaks the chains of habitual patterns that lead nowhere.'
Steve thought for a moment about what he had just heard, finding it hard to believe that the schlepper from 7-11 had these kinds of ideas floating around in his head. 'So let me get this straight. This floaty, shiny place we're standing in is…the seventh dimension?' Steve asked, looking around at the dazzling lake, which he now noticed was teeming with fish flowing with fantastic colorful grace.
'Put it this way. How many sides does a cube have?' 7-11 clerk become flaming wizard asked.
'Six.'
'Six plus one! One plus six!' Sim-lev corrected.
'You forgot the in-side, my friend. The seventh side, like the seventh day of the week is the one which all of the others revolve around. Without the in-side, without a central, uniting, purpose giving heart at the core, pumping inspiration and infusing our surroundings with meaning, life just spins around us in endless circles leading nowhere.'
'I know it's getting late and you must be really tired, so allow me to fin-nish by averting your attention to those fish. The Hebrew word for fish, 'dag', is comprised of the two letters gimmel and daleth, which correspond to the numbers 3 and 4 respectively. Together they equal seven, or 'sheva' in Hebrew, which is the numerical equivalent of 372, which is the same as Sim-lev, which means 'Pay attention'…'
'Please,' Steve interrupted, 'no more mathematics. I get the picture. But you left out one thing.'
'Oh?'
'What's the stuff in the jar?'
'Ahh.' The man said, removing the lid and taking some of the dirt in his hand, 'This is Seventh Earth'
With that he tossed the sparkling dirt at Steve, encompassing him in a brilliant light…
Steve awoke suddenly to the sound of the phone ringing. 'Hello?' He answered groggily.
'Hi Steve. This is Mr. Sim-lev from Sony. We were supposed to have a meeting today ? You wanted to show me some dream-inducing product you've been developing?'
'Oh yeah. I was just running a final trial before bringing it in. I'll be right there sir.'