I’ve been spending time with a friend who has a rare kind of cancer. Her doctor’s prognosis is that she has 12 months to live. With that prediction in mind, she has decided to forego the recommended protocol of chemotherapy and just live her life to the utmost. How is it possible that people I know, those who are dear to me, and those who are younger than I, can die? It seems impossible. That is because death is usually kept at arm’s length. When people are told that they will die from a terminal illness, they embark on an entirely different life journey than they were on. It is as if you were heading to Alice Springs from Adelaide, and suddenly did a right angle turn to go to Canberra instead. All your friends might be cooling their heels waiting for you to show up in Alice but you’ve gone off for tests, oncology appointments, radiation therapy, chemotherapy. You’ve needed to start ‘making arrangements’. My friend is shedding her belongings, cleaning out closets and distributing old albums and mementos to her family. Every phone conversation and meeting for coffee with her comes into sharp relief because they are limited commodities. The awesome truth is that each moment of every interaction we have is precious, but because we buddy up more to the past and future, we miss what’s right here. My friend is remarkably here, even with the discomfort she experiences in her body. Even with the crazy behaviours and opinions people around her demonstrate when they discover she’s staring down death. Sometimes it’s said that the dying process is a gift, for those departing and those staying behind.
There’s nothing like a deadline to get the old blood flowing. All the juices, really. It doesn’t follow, if you think about it. You’d assume certain things … certain activities … would become unimportant. Certain betrayals would become unbearable. But they don’t really. In fact, quite the opposite. Everything takes on a new light. The impossible becomes possible, desirable even. It’s quite remarkable.
WALTER WYKES, The Salmon Tribunal
2 Comments
Jan
on May 8, 2013 at 8:19 pm
Inspiring post Eve. Not many people dare to talk about dying and death, although it is a fact that we all will have to face death. If you can prepare for death, like your friend, can live life indeed more preciously. No matter how healthy we are, no matter how young, we can all die suddenly and unexpectedly. A real tragedy if one is not prepared.
Is it better perhaps if we have a chance – 6 months or a year – to ‘arrange our affairs’ and to say our good-byes. It’s a sad time, potentially, but a time of heightened experience.
Namaste, Jan.
Inspiring post Eve. Not many people dare to talk about dying and death, although it is a fact that we all will have to face death. If you can prepare for death, like your friend, can live life indeed more preciously. No matter how healthy we are, no matter how young, we can all die suddenly and unexpectedly. A real tragedy if one is not prepared.
Is it better perhaps if we have a chance – 6 months or a year – to ‘arrange our affairs’ and to say our good-byes. It’s a sad time, potentially, but a time of heightened experience.
Namaste, Jan.