On Death

I think about death quite a bit.

“The meaning of life is that it stops.” – Franz Kafka

I think about death quite a bit.

Probably more than is healthy but I do.

I don't think of it though as the worst thing that can happen, if it happens to me. I fear its occurrence to other people, when it will strike at a point close enough to hurt me but far enough to leave me alive.

I've had a few deaths close to me in recent months. None of them were people I'm particularly close to but all of them were people I liked.

People whose deaths were close to me. Close enough to hurt me but far enough to leave me alive.

You see, I think death is playing games with me. Coming in ever closer, it just dancing around the edges of my threshold for pain.

Death is torturous, but no, not the actual dying, but the anticipation of it.

I imagine what it must feel like knowing that you're dying in a few hours. A few minutes. The next few seconds. There probably is just oblivion after that. Must be exciting to be able to see yourself leave your body, though.

I then picture what it must feel like holding the hands of one that you love as they die. I'd go mad. Mad with pain and imagination. My thoughts probing and diving deeper into the possible paths that the soul may take. So very visual with memories, that happened and that i wish happened.

First to go was my aunt. I wasn't really close to her but I love her children to bits. Her husband, my uncle, was my first childhood hero. "Chief Ahmed!" He'd call me. "Chief Ahmed, Omo Taye". Referring to my mum's status as the first of twin girls. I was thankfully too young when he died to have developed the dread for death. When my aunt died, I felt more pain for my cousins' loss than for myself. She was old enough that the pain was tempered with with some curiosity: has she met her husband yet?! Will she?

Perhaps I've thought about death so much that I'm hardened to it.

Second was a girl I met through work. First time I met her, she said to me "you're cute" and I smiled as her colleagues teased her for "not having a filter" for her thoughts. I remember thinking she was very sweet but I never told her. We must be professional, yeah? She died and I didn't mourn. Couldn't mourn. She was far enough not to hurt me but close enough to make me think about what could have been if I had gotten closer.

I never even met the third. He was a brother to another person I met through work. I am chummy with this colleague, I dare say we are even friends. So her hurt, it hurt me. I could see it in her eyes as she struggled to cope. I could sense it when she felt guilty for laughing so hard. I could feel it in my bones, every week she wore black to mourn her loss.

If these can reach me and hurt me, how awful will death really feel when I have ever to confront it?

“Dying is a troublesome business: there is pain to be suffered, and it wrings one’s heart; but death is a splendid thing — a warfare accomplished, a beginning all over again, a triumph. You can always see that in their faces.” – George Bernard Shaw