On death
The only safe question when speaking about death is “how?”.
Any other question and you sound like a heartless jerk. You don’t want to sound like a heartless jerk. Do you? Especially when you are.
When speaking about death you are never allowed to ask what you really care about, like:
Did she left anything to me?
Did this asshole suffered enough?
Can I just cry or do I have to do anything? Like really Do. Which I would prefer not to — cause I don’t like to, you know, doing stuff.
Especially for the dead.
Like cooking on departing party. I think I have just invented the term. What is it about having to feed your relatives on various occasions. Did the death somehow make you hungry? Or you just know in your heart, that without food it will be nothing to do with all those people. In fact, some of them would not even come. Fine with me! But, yeah I suppose it’s safer with food. Don’t really want my relatives to end up discussing my life choices or anything. So, more chicken, aunt Mary?
Or writing all those articles with condolences — oh, it’s a shame we shall not see Mr. X anymore. Whoever he is. And you are supposed to say something positive about him. Good or nothing about those who are gone. I’ll talk about it later. So, eventually you end up with some pretty template which could be applied to anyone’s life. He was a loving spouse, devoted father and a reliable colleague. And didn’t return my fifty dollars which he borrowed on booze. No, you can’t say the last part. So, luckily it wasn’t 5 grands.
Or searching the malls for black clothes. Like I can’t be sad in yellow. Yellow is the most miserable colour if you ask me, but somehow in western civilisation you need to wear one uniform colour. Can I just wear whatever doesn’t make me itch and sweat at 30 degrees Celsius? Because I am still fucking alive.
So, I hate to do the work which no-one cares about. And you know what, Dead Do NOT Care.
They don’t care which coffin colour you’ll choose. Material, fashion, cushions, like, comfortable, soft, adorable, shiny cushions. Why do we care so much about the coffin. So that your dead relative would feel comfortable inside? If she feels something that means she’s not fucking dead! And you are trying to bury your very much alive mother-in-law, for Christ sake!
Why do we care about the expenses on funerals? You know, to do it with class, to order luxury tombstone and a huge pack of flowers. And some nice suit for the deceased. And some make-up. So nice make-up that some cannot afford to do on the wedding day. Stuff like that. We find it curious when we hear about Egyptians who have built huge fucking pyramids just to bury their cool ones. We laugh at them, don’t we? In fact, we so refuse to believe in this, that we came up with thousands of crazy theories on pyramids just to cover the craziest truth ever.
Pyramids, the greatest wonder of our planet, construction people lived, worked hard and died for, if you think about that, is completely, utterly useless. Just like dog haircuts.
And we don’t believe people could be so stupid that they wasted money and energy and effort on such a dumb thing! And then you read about a coffin with a TV-set inside … — no, stupidity doesn’t die! It’s like Elvis Presley of human qualities. Or Lenin.
So, only two things are very much reliable in this world. Death and stupidity. And I am not sure about the first one.
And what about talking about the dead? The funerals, fine, it’s a ritual and it ends, but the bullshit about afterlife can go on forever. This whole notion of someone who continues to hear stuff, see stuff, feel stuff and know stuff, doesn’t it make person alive and conscious? We know that the person is unconscious when she can’t receive the signals from outside world and react on them. But somehow the dead person can. So, why do we care about brain in that case. Or eyes, or ears and other organs. If you lost your eyesight, just die. And you’ll be able to see again, right? Convenient. That’s why religions forbid suicide. If it’s so fucking awesome to die, everyone should try ones.
So, anyway, let’s assume there is afterlife. And you are supposed to meet with all who are already dead after you die. Like, reunion with your parents, grandparents from both sides, grand-grand-parents, rude grand-uncles, crazy grand-aunts, annoying spouses and so on. And to spend with them eternity. What kind of exquisite torture is it?
That is where some religions came up with a clever twist. This notion that there are two places. For good people and bad people. And.. of course you want to end up in the other place than the people you don’t like. But what if you don’t.
If something doesn’t work out, you say that it just happened this way. Someone is always to blame — like weather, government, neighbours, God. If someone die from their own stupidity you don’t actually say that. Well, actually you do, in some cases when it’s not someone you know and it was really fucked up.
You know the Darwin Award? It’s hilarious.
You won’t believe how many people died taking selfies with elephants or pooling out their precious cell-phones from various places, in one case public toilet a.k.a. a hole in the ground. That should smell like a bad idea, right? I mean literally.
So, I guess, stupidity, of which as you know I am not a huge fan, stupidity also makes life interesting. But maybe not your stupidity. Or not mine. Stupidity is like death in this matter. You always assume it will happen to someone else. Not you. And that’s why we don’t like to take responsibility. Could be good idea, could be bad.
So, most of the time, when talking about death, you usually say it’s a fate, like it couldn’t be avoided. Well, it could. Quite often. All so popular and suddenly-saint-after-death Steve Jobs could have done a better job if he went to doctors right away. Not to some “alternative” doctors, because the alternative to medicine is not-medicine. India spirituality and other mumbo-jumbo may have lead to business discoveries, open-mindedness and stuff, but the thing is cancer doesn’t care about your open-mindedness. So does death.
But, you know that is a good thing. Good about death. The fact that everyone dies. The open-minded and conservative, smart and stupid, ugly and beautiful. The good ones and the bad ones. So that life itself can continue with something new. Dictators and the country can breath free, or try a new one, at least there will be some diversity there. Old retrogrades die and young scientists can finally push their crazy ideas. Like Earth goes around the Sun, or evolution, or DNA, not protein, as a molecule of genetic information. Artists die and suddenly become extremely popular. And do not develop a star syndrome in process, which is also good.
So, basically death makes life interesting. I’d say if there is some meaning in all this it’s to live interesting life. Yeah, we’d like to leave something after us, or do good, or raise children, but all of this is just procreation for the sake of procreation. And you can make the process pleasant as well. Like sex. But sex is another story. Today I want you to think about death. And stupidity. And I wish you to meet less with both of them, even though wishful thinking does not really effect anything. Just so you know.
Thank you.
