Dear Readers,
In Chapter 24, I gave you my thoughts on how to cope with the loss of a patient, using logic that must have impressed me no end. Something to the effect that “life goes on, and you should, too.”
But that was kind of stark. So, I also pointed out that it's entirely normal to go on loving someone special who has left this realm. Doing so has helped me tremendously. My wife, the center of my existence for nearly five decades, was taken from me by cancer in late 2014 — and five years later, I know I will never get her out of my mind. (We can't help but linger in the warm memories of people who lit up our lives, can we?)
Today I am back on the theme of how to get your mind around a patient's death, but now I am focusing on another — somewhat more uplifting — platitude: “We all gotta go sometime!”
This one should have universal appeal. Especially for me: I turned 81 last January, and I can now personally identify with the Biblical observation that “our days are numbered.” (To say that I am not the man I used to be would be the understatement of the year.)
The corollary to this second platitude, I think, is that we all will be reunited after death, possibly as souls without bodies, and have a phenomenal reunion — a series of spectacular catch-up chats, perhaps for eternity. No proof yet, but, to my mind, nothing else would make much sense.
Sadly, many people believe that, when we die, the lights go out, and that's it. I am too optimistic (and perhaps too full of myself!) to buy that. I think that when we die, the lights will go on, and each of us will meet God. I personally believe, from my childhood exposure to Christianity, that He is the omniscient, omnipotent genius who created the universe. I cannot accept that creation happened as a random series of events, reflecting only the laws of physics (to the extent that we now know them).
For me, the only logical outcome after death is that we “meet our Maker,” get our report cards, and get answers to all the questions that form in our minds as we slog through our mortal lives, shaking our heads and despairing of ever getting the big picture. Nothing else computes for this old dog (me), and I'm looking forward to a huge party in the sky, one of these days.
Yeah, it sounds like a fairy tale — but I need one! It is my contention that need drives belief, and I derive great comfort from the theory that Someone much smarter than I will ever be is running the whole show.
I am already framing questions for the loved ones I will catch up with when I wear out and move on.
When I do catch up with them, if we're without bodies, I will first rub souls with Carol Ann Hearons, nee Esser. Then ask my parents how in the world they coped with raising seven kids.
There will be confessions and apologies aplenty.
Sorry, Ma and Pa, that I was a young firebug, shoplifter, liar, and vandal who needed (and got) a lot of important correction.
Sorry, Mrs. C., for finding your lost dime and not returning it.
Sorry, Lucille, for humiliating you in the third grade, just to get a laugh from the class.
Sorry, boy in the sandbox whose name escapes me, for roughing you up during my bullying days.
Well, you get the idea. To say that I was a perfect child would be the Willie Whopper of all time. And, since my imperfections accompany me in later life, my act of contrition may be a whopper, too!
But I feel no huge rush to die and come clean in the afterlife to everyone I ever cared about.
As I have told you in previous chapters, I want to live to be 100 years old, just to see how things turn out on Planet Earth. (I may pull that off. My doc says I'm healthy as a horse.)
Plus, I am also still caregiver to my kid sister and her eccentric canine companion (also known as “the old woman and her funky dawg”).
Plus, if I manage to live till January 4, 2038, I will have 19 more years to clean up my act — and have a lot less to apologize for to the dearly departed, when I depart, myself!
That's my plan, anyway, based on Platitude 2 (“We all gotta go sometime!”) and Corollary 2 (which argues for an afterlife reunion that will absolutely blow your mind).
I guess I'm saying that death is a natural part of mortal life — and the best is yet to come. Yeah, that's it. I truly hope you can track with all this. It sure is helping me!
—Michael E. Hearons
