Carnett: Imagine our giants carrying on in heaven

What will God permit us to take with us into heaven?

Ever ponder that question? This lapsed Lutheran, short-lived agnostic and now-practicing evangelical has mulled it a time or two himself.

Provided I’m issued an invitation, maybe I’ll be allowed to bring a favorite pet. Or how about that VW that I drove in college? Perhaps that stretch of Balboa Peninsula beachfront where I learned to bodysurf?

The eternal is light-years beyond my comprehension.

Can football be transported to heaven? American football. I can’t imagine eternity without a super-size version of the college football playoffs.

But no Aussie rules “footy,” thanks, or Premier League soccer. The Premier League season would no doubt run for a century or longer, with all scores nil-nil.

What about March Madness, the 68-team NCAA basketball tournament? Since time won’t be a factor, every matchup could be a best-of-seven series.

Now trust me on this one: How about bringing along Sir Georg Solti and the Chicago Symphony?

Yeah, the whole lot, from Sir Georg to the guy on the triangle. Surely we can’t have heaven without one of the world’s great conductors and arguably its finest orchestra.

Heaven’s certain to have classical music, don’t you think? Of course, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 will be infantile babbling. God’s own compositions (newly mastered by Deutsche Grammophon and available in a 32-album collection) will blow your socks off. They’ll bounce magnificently off whirling galaxies and soar beyond the far reaches of the cosmos.

Forgive my yammering. I’m sure God has this all under control.

Are you familiar with maestro Solti (pronounced Shoal-tee), “the Baron of Budapest”? I admit to having a man-crush on him. He is — was — Mr. Ultra-Cool. Sir Georg reminds me of my Uncle Edwin. Like Solti, my Uncle Ed seemed unapproachable to me. He was the patriarch of our family.

Edwin was my father’s uncle (his mother’s big brother). That made him extra big in our household.

Sir Georg and Uncle Ed never met and have both been gone for a very long time. Ed died decades ago at 92. Solti passed in 1997 at age 84.

They’re both probably pacing the gilded halls of that place I’ve just been rhapsodizing about. Uncle Ed is saying grace at every banquet he attends (he did that on earth better than anyone I’ve ever known), and Georg leads heaven’s varsity band.

Georg was tall like Uncle Ed and wiry. They both sported bald spots and had thick brows and prominent — intelligent — foreheads. Solti’s body exuded a dancer’s grace, though it had a stiff, angular inclination. He grimaced as he conducted. He seemed either in the throes of some profound ecstasy or about to stalk off the podium.

His message was unambiguous: This stuff is serious!

Yet, one smile from the maestro could light up a concert hall. I’m told that an average human felt honored to be in his presence.

While conducting, Solti lurched over his orchestra like a praying mantis — wheedling, threatening, demanding. His neck, torso and large hands were stiff and deliberate — but always elegant.

That’s how Solti looked as he conducted such world-class orchestras as the L.A. Philharmonic, the Orchestre de Paris and the Chicago Symphony, and that’s how my uncle appeared every time I saw him.

Some viewed Ed as intimidating. But anybody who prayed before meals, patted his grand nephews benignly on the head and called my dad “Billy” had to be a softy.

Solti was a genius, and that mantle was perhaps his burden. His life was filled with achievement, but he was forced to live up to his own impossible standards. No easy task.

Uncle Ed had something Sir Georg didn’t: my Aunt Margaret. “Mags” was his rock. She wasn’t Beethoven or Mahler, but she was a pip.

Not bound by impossible expectations, Ed seemed content with his life. He needed just two things: God and Margaret. Besides keeping him grounded, she was also the author of glorious desserts.

Finally, that may have been what separated Georg and Edwin.

Cobbler.

JIM CARNETT, who lives in Costa Mesa, worked for Orange Coast College for 37 years.