On Death and Dying
I once asked my grandfather, a decorated soldier from WWI, if he was worried about dying. “No,” he replied. “Why not?” “Well, Roger, we’re all going to die. We just don’t know when. So, if I worry, I will die. If I don’t worry, I will die. So, why worry about it?” I was about five years old at the time and we were standing outside the Swansea Hospital, as was, by the seat where the old men used to sit and gossip. I didn’t realize it at the time, but that was my first lesson in Stoicism.
“The day I was born, I took my first step on the path to death.” Francisco de Quevedo (1580-1645), Spanish Neo-Stoic, among so many other things. Thinking like that tends to put things into perspective, for death walks with us every day. Death is our twin sibling, brother or sister. We face his shadow every time we look in the mirror and that shadow follows us around all day. “Death is a law, not a punishment, so why worry about it?” Also Quevedo. Dying is a different matter and yes, there are so many ways to go, some of them, especially nowadays, with the advent of life-preserving medicines, slow and unpleasant. Yet, mors omnia solvit – death solves everything. And it brings a release from all pain and suffering.
The lead photo shows a plaque in Avila (Spain). La Calle de la Cruz (1660) -The Street of the Cross. It is also known locally as La Calle de la Vida y de la Muerte – The Street of Life and Death. Why? It is rumored that here, turning left outside the main cathedral, duels were fought. Two men entered, but only one emerged alive. It is interesting to meditate on the close proximity of life and death, always there, side by side.
So, for the fun of it, let’s change the question: what is life? “What is life? A frenzy. What is life? An illusion, a shadow, a fiction. And the greatest good is small, for the whole of life is a dream, and dreams are nothing but dreams, after all.” Life is a Dream, Calderon (1600-1681). Looked at from this point of view, what is death? Is it the shutting down and the turning off of the cerebral computer or is it the great awakening from the sleep of life? You can think of it either way but, either way, it’s pointless worrying about it. As my grandfather also told me: “If there’s nothing afterwards, I’ll just fall asleep and that will be the end of it. But if death is the great awakening, then I will be very happy to wake up in a new reality.”
Robert Bly, in The Sibling Society, writes of the lateral movement that now embraces society with its grip of instant pleasure, instant gratification, instant happiness. As a result, we have strayed far from the vertical knowledge that sustained us for centuries. We have abandoned the wise words of our ancestors. Now the old are no longer the keepers of wisdom and the guardians of culture, the institutional memories of the race, if you like. Now they are foolish, clumsy, out of date with the world’s most rapid advances. Only the young, and their siblings, can keep up with the ever changing instants of life as presented to us.
But all is not lost. “What a peaceful life, that of the wise man who withdraws from this noisy world and follows the hidden path along which the world’s wisest people have always walked.” Fray Luis de Leon (1527-1591). We can move far from the madding crowd. We can construct our own realities. We can base them on the words of wisdom handed down to us over the generations. Switch off the TV. Watch the sun as it moves across the cathedral face (Monet) or the walls of your house (Moo). Live each moment of each day. Do not fall into despair. Above, don’t worry – it does no good at all.
rogermoorepoet 
Purpose is all that keeps us alive🤔after we’ve completed it, death comes🤐🤐
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So true. That and today’s magic medicines – not healing for all! Thank for the visit and the comment.
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Thank you too
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Wow! Great endorsement. I’m so happy that we have “met” and become friends. I sometimes feel like a part of your family,, and you are definitely a part of mine.
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Thanks, Angela! I’d invite you over for supper tonight, but we’re going down to -40C/F – not the sort of night to be traveling!!!
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Gee Roger, I had already chosen a warm outfit to wear in case you asked me over. My mistake, but I hope you didn’t miss me too much.
Actually I cancelled my visit with my aunt today because our temp. was 18F and I wimped out of sitting out there waiting for the bus.
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Glad I am not sitting out there waiting for the bus! I e-mailed you with our current temperature – -46C with the wind chill = -52F (give or take).
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I replied to the email this morning, very early. I think I’ll postpone that dinner date until it warms up in Canada!
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Great advice, Roger. I was afraid of death at one time, although I have known most of my life that we begin dying with our first breath, Then I stood by my dad’s bed as he took his last breath after being beside him all day, watching the light on his face while he pointed to the wall and said “they are so beautiful. Can you see them?” I wish I could have seen them, but because of his passing I was determined to work for Hospice, a goal I set in 1991 and fulfilled in 1998. Now I am patiently waiting my turn at the sights he saw that day. Death is now a promise of life, not a sentence of loss of life. I’ll just move on to another plane, free of the chains that bind me to this world.
And if I ever come back, I want to be someone’s pampered lap dog. Or a wolf!
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That would be a lovely prompt – what would you like to come back as in another life? Neither suit you, Angela, nor lapdog, nor wolf. Maybe a cartoonist with a vicious sense of humor? Maybe a short order chef with sticky French Fires that don’t leave the fingers and spaghetti that won’t unwind? Luvs ya! In the best sense of the words!!!!
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Well, I was once told by a Native American medicine man that my aura indicates I am of the Wolf Clan. Strong female leader, earth mother, family above all others. It made me proud of who I am. But on the other hand, the short order French chef is an intriguing idea. Can’t draw well enough to be a cartoonist, but then again, maybe I could. My best drawings look like cartoons.
You’re right about that being a great prompt. Now I have to think of more menu items for my restaurant, and a character for my cartoon. The vicious sense of humor is already at work.
Many hugs and lots of love back at you.
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Wolf and Wolf Clan are two different things. Everything you say above from the Native American Medicine Man rings true to me. And yes, you should be proud of who you are. And I am proud to know you!
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