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The Truth Once Spoken
Aug. 1st, 2014 01:17 pmValjean: On this page
I write my last confession.
Read it well, when I at last am sleeping.
It’s the story
Of one who learned to love
When you were in my keeping.
Fantine: Come with me,
Where chains will never bind you.
All your grief,
At last, at last behind you.
Lord in heaven,
Look down on him in mercy.
Valjean: Forgive me all my trespasses
And take me to your glory.
Fantine: Take my hand,
I’ll lead you to salvation.
Take my love,
For love is everlasting.
And remember,
The truth that once was spoken –
To love another person
Is to see the face of God.
(Epilogue: Les Misérable, by Schonberg, Boublil, Nate, & Kretzmer – 1980)
The idea of writing my own eulogy came from a movie I saw two months ago with Kathy called, Fault In Our Stars. It was a Young Adult (YA) melodrama about two cancer-surviving teenagers dealing with Love and Death. I won’t tire you with the details or plot of the movie, or my thoughts about the themes and metaphors it presented. Suffice it to say that it stimulated a lot of post-cinema analysis and discussion. I was especially intrigued by a part of the movie where the youthful narrator said that cancer survivors were encouraged to write their own death eulogies as part of their therapy. I was not aware of this practice being applied to young people. I’d heard stories of elderly hospice patients, facing terminal illness, doing so, and I knew that overly-controlling seniors, with possible obsessive-compulsive disorders, wrote detailed plans for their funeral and burial, even writing their own obituaries – but I never heard of teenagers doing it. Somehow it sounded a bit juvenile and pretentious, like Willie Loman glorifying his own wake and funeral in Death of a Salesman. I could see adult or elderly, terminal patients writing such testimonials, but not children. Surely only mature people who were close to death had the maturity to say something valuable about the dying process, not teenagers. Nevertheless, I was intrigued by the idea. After all, we’re all “terminal patients” waiting for our eventual deaths, aren’t we? What would you say to the living, which have gathered together to participate in this funerary rite for you? Why do they come, anyway? I doubt they come seeking answers to about your life. If I did write such a eulogy what would I say? The questions haunted me for the remainder of that day, and into the next. Finally, curiosity won out and I decided to try my hand at writing one, to see what came out. Here is what I wrote:
First of all, I want to say that I really enjoyed this life. In fact, it was a great life and I loved it. I hope it lasted well into my 80’s, so that Kathy and I were able to spend a long, long, time together, seeing movies and plays, talking, traveling, and spending time spoiling our grandchildren. I hope I lived long enough to see Sarah and Grace’s graduation from high school and college, and watch Toñito and Nikki’s children grow up. I want to thank you all for coming today and supporting my wife, children, grandchildren, family members, and surviving friends who were able to attend. I hope they’re dealing with my death better than I did with my own father’s. I do apologize for the time and inconveniences my death may have caused, but I appreciate your coming for those I love and leave behind. Having said that, there’s nothing more I want to say about the events of my life. I’m also not qualified to advise you on how to feel happy, safe, or more secure, and less uncertain about death. You are on your own. I’m dead, and the physical tie that bound me to each of you has been severed, and will not be restored. The only temporal part of me that will survive will be your memories, aided sometimes by stories, photographs, and writings. I do, however, have some thoughts about what I learned along the way that I don’t mind sharing.
When I was alive, I was always struck by the importance some people, especially prominent leaders, politicians, businessmen, and wealthy individuals, placed on their legacy. They seemed to confuse the idea of “a good life” as meaning a life, or an inheritance, that is remembered and memorialized by many, many, many people, for a long time. After my few years of living, I finally came to the conclusion that a good life is simply one in which we love, and are loved in return. As the Beatles’ so aptly but it, “love is all you need.” But at the same time, love and a good life doesn’t negate the existence of sorrow, pain, and suffering, either in our own lives, or the world in general. I have experienced a few personal difficulties, sorrows, heartbreaks, and humiliations, but I have witnessed many more terrible tragedies. Those are the harsh trials that make living so hard, and so prompt many people to question the existence of God, and the power of Love. How can a “loving, merciful God allow so much evil, tragedy, and death to exist?” Learning how to answer that question always seemed more important for a happy life, than leaving a historical legacy, or an inheritance, that nations and families would remember.
I suppose I learned a better perspective on a good life and death from Sarah Kathleen, my first granddaughter. I had the wonderful opportunity of babysitting and observing her during the infant years, beginning at 6 months of age. She is my best example of being joyous and living a happy life, without having the slightest fear of sorrow, tragedy, or death. As she grew up, Sarah experienced wonder, awe, and joy every morning we went for a walk. It showed in her face, her eyes, and her voice. I experienced similar flashes of such momentary bliss with my friends Wayne, Jim, and Greg on camping trips to Big Sur; with Kathy, when we walked, hand-in-hand, along beaches during golden sunsets; and driving home in the car with Toñito and Prisa, listening to tales of their days in school. Those moments, which happened too infrequently as I got older, occurred every day to Sarah when we played in the backyard, walked through a garden, or strolled through a park. I watched her eyes light up in wonder at each new sight and sensation – watching butterflies in flight, hummingbirds in midair, and the colorful splendor of flowers, ferns, and blossoms. I watched her discovering the joy of each moment, and seeing the miracles of life that surrounded her, while at the same time knowing that the possibility of injury and death lurked around every corner, and on each street and driveway. A minute’s distraction, a fateful turn of a car, or a driver’s sidelong glances at their cell phone, could precipitate a tragic accident, a terrible injury, or the loss of life. An anomalous germ can be accidently inhaled, a virus ingested, or an infection ignored, triggering a crippling malady, or life-threatening illness. These terrifying thoughts would sometimes flash in my mind as I observed Sarah’s wonderment of life, and dwelling on them could have frightened me into always taking extreme precautions or never letting her out. But these thoughts and images were not real – they were merely illusions, or manifestations, of my fears and uncertainties. Sarah dealt in the real – that was all that surrounded her. She saw The Emperor’s New Clothes for what they were, and did not dwell on what if’s, what might’s, or what should’s. Sarah was a focused participant in each moment. At her age, Sarah had no notions of mortality and death, tragedy or cruelty, these were theoretical concepts she had not been taught, nor yet learned. Cause and effect is an adult paradigm, and parents and educators build upon its foundation. “If you throw a ball up, it will fall to the ground”, is the start. Soon it becomes, “if you throw the ball in any other direction, it might hit someone. Therefore, don’t throw the ball, rock, or stick”. Parents and educators teach such generalizations about reality. We fence in reality. We give it boundaries. We limit life to an accidental and random beginning that comes all too quickly to a harsh and squalid end. However, for three-year old Sarah, life has neither beginning nor end – life is life, a wondrous continuum of joy and bliss, which adults cannot comprehend. So adults formulate generalizations, laws, and norms to control and understand it, and then they create consequences to enforce them.
When Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these”, I think he was referring to this idea. He admonished us to not constrain, nor limit the youthful joys of experiencing and participating in the fullness of life. Children see the realities of the kingdom that surrounds us in life. He was telling us that kids “get it” so stop trying to force their innocent perceptions into contrived adult formulas. Anthony de Mello, the Jesuit priest and spiritual director used the metaphor of “waking up”, to explain the attainment of awareness that yogis, gurus, and mystics reach through their meditative practices. He believed that adults sleep walk through life, completely oblivious to the grace and mystery that surrounds them. Awareness, he said, allows us to finally see and experience the kingdom of heaven. We are already in the midst of its beauty and wonder, every day and every moment, but we lack the eyes to see, the ears to hear, or the nose to sense it. Instead we learn to generalize, define, and explain this existence by logical and scientific methods, thereby remaining asleep and unaware of the Truth. Babies, infants, and small children haven’t learned these adult lessons of living, or the fear of dying, yet. They are only aware of the continuous wonder of life. When Sarah turned 3 ½ years of age, I again saw her in that timeless state of grace when she was dancing in her first recital. Through the eyes of love, I watched Sarah gliding and swaying in harmony with the rhythms of music and movement, and lost to the laws of time and space. For too briefly a time, Sarah was in the kingdom of heaven, and back to that place from which she had sprung. The continuum of life – that is the infinite line of progression on which I believe Sarah, and now her then two-month old sister Grace, are on. They can’t describe it, because it can only be experienced, and not defined.
I’ve also learned to doubt the validity of the adult truism, that there is no more tragic and unjust a death as the loss of a child who “never had the chance to fully experience life”. I wonder if the only thing infants lose by an “early death” is the adult pain of dealing with the death of their children. Despite our ability to measure and quantify life and reality, death is still a concept that adults struggle with – and honestly, so did I. When my father died in 1971, I readily accepted the adult equation, LIFE = BIRTH + DEATH, and I prayed that the Church’s doctrine of resurrection was valid. I’d been to the funerals of my great-grandmother, Granny, and my great-aunt, Tía Tina. I had seen their caskets, and touched their cold faces as they lay in state during their rosaries and funerals. But my father’s death was different. His death caused an irreparable wound in my heart. My dad, the man I loved, trusted, and admired was gone. And yet for many years after, I magically believed he returned. I saw him in cars, driving by me on the freeway, and he visited my dreams in a variety of scenes. Oddly, it was only when I became a father, with children of my own, that these visions stopped. The dreams continued, but the details of my father’s face and mannerisms became hazier and hazier, and less clear and distinct.
The upshot was that for many years after my father’s death, I dreaded going to funerals. I avoided them whenever possible, and when I couldn’t, I hardened my heart to the raw emotions surrounding the proceedings. I numbed myself so well, that upon the passing of my grandparents, I don’t remember feeling anything during their services. Going to funerals was a duty, an obligation, and I separated myself from the grief and anguish that permeated the ceremonies, and which I had once felt after my father’s death. I was successful in this numbing strategy for many years, until the deaths and funerals of my sister-in-law, Debbie, and my mother-in-law, Mary. In a span of 3 years, I watched Kathy and her siblings struggle through the shocking deaths of a sister and mother. Although they continued telling jokes and stories to raise theirs spirits, they were bereft, confused, and in some cases, angry. I did the best I could at being stoic and supportive during both of their funerals, but when I caught sight of my younger brother Eddie at the conclusion of the requiem mass for Mary, I lost it. Feeling that he had taken the time, and come to see me, out of compassion and love, unleashed all of my suppressed emotions and heartaches. I was so relieved and overjoyed to see him, and hug him, at a time of such intense sadness and grief, that I was overwhelmed and I started weeping uncontrollably in his arms. That moment brought to mind a long forgotten scene that took place on the evening of my father’s rosary. I was standing alone, in front of the church, feeling forlorn and abandoned, when out of the darkness emerged my 3 high school friends, Wayne, Jim, and Greg. They came to be with me, to console me, and their presence filled me with joy, humor, and hope. Eddie’s presence, along with the added discovery of my longtime friends John and Kathy O’Riley at the reception, had the same effect. Those encounters reformed my attitude about funerals. I learned that they are not for the dead; they are for the living. It is a rite that helps us progress through the stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance) after the death of a loved one.
Sadly, my own infancy has passed, and I never became a saint or mystic who was aware of the spiritual reality of God’s kingdom on earth. I was simply a man who had the good fortune, or grace, to be loved and to love in return. Growing up, it was only in those brief, blissful moments of joy that I shared with my parents, my brothers and sisters, my friends, my wife, and my children and grandchildren, that I experienced glimpses of the eternal infinity of love and the wonder of God’s world without end. After this funeral, it would be nice to be remembered and occasionally thought of, and talked about, by the people I loved and who loved me. Remembered in the stories you tell, or memories shared by photographs or the words I wrote. But I really don’t care. I have moved on to that place Jesus pointed to in his death and resurrection – that continuum from whence I came that is so often mislabeled heaven or paradise. I am home…
After finishing the first draft of this “Eulogy”, I asked Kathy to read it over. When I spoke with her later, the first thing she said about it was, “It’s not a eulogy”. She was right. I had started writing without any research into what a eulogy should contain. In comparing my efforts against wikiHow’s 5 guidelines, I discovered that I missed the mark entirely! I didn’t keep the tone light and happy. I didn’t aim it at any particular audience. I provided little biographical information about myself, and none of my personal qualities or characteristics. Finally, I wasn’t very concise or well organized. All I did was mention the movie, Fault In Our Stars, and I shared my views on life and death. Upon reflection, I’ve written on this subject before (see tag: death) and it continues being a topic of fear, wonder, and speculation. Obviously, the movie got me thinking about it once again, and I felt the need to write about it. So, please forgive an aging man his ceaseless curiosity about life and death, and his musings about them. I have definitely learned one thing about this experience: I should not be the go-to-guy for any future eulogies, especially my own.
I write my last confession.
Read it well, when I at last am sleeping.
It’s the story
Of one who learned to love
When you were in my keeping.
Fantine: Come with me,
Where chains will never bind you.
All your grief,
At last, at last behind you.
Lord in heaven,
Look down on him in mercy.
Valjean: Forgive me all my trespasses
And take me to your glory.
Fantine: Take my hand,
I’ll lead you to salvation.
Take my love,
For love is everlasting.
And remember,
The truth that once was spoken –
To love another person
Is to see the face of God.
(Epilogue: Les Misérable, by Schonberg, Boublil, Nate, & Kretzmer – 1980)
The idea of writing my own eulogy came from a movie I saw two months ago with Kathy called, Fault In Our Stars. It was a Young Adult (YA) melodrama about two cancer-surviving teenagers dealing with Love and Death. I won’t tire you with the details or plot of the movie, or my thoughts about the themes and metaphors it presented. Suffice it to say that it stimulated a lot of post-cinema analysis and discussion. I was especially intrigued by a part of the movie where the youthful narrator said that cancer survivors were encouraged to write their own death eulogies as part of their therapy. I was not aware of this practice being applied to young people. I’d heard stories of elderly hospice patients, facing terminal illness, doing so, and I knew that overly-controlling seniors, with possible obsessive-compulsive disorders, wrote detailed plans for their funeral and burial, even writing their own obituaries – but I never heard of teenagers doing it. Somehow it sounded a bit juvenile and pretentious, like Willie Loman glorifying his own wake and funeral in Death of a Salesman. I could see adult or elderly, terminal patients writing such testimonials, but not children. Surely only mature people who were close to death had the maturity to say something valuable about the dying process, not teenagers. Nevertheless, I was intrigued by the idea. After all, we’re all “terminal patients” waiting for our eventual deaths, aren’t we? What would you say to the living, which have gathered together to participate in this funerary rite for you? Why do they come, anyway? I doubt they come seeking answers to about your life. If I did write such a eulogy what would I say? The questions haunted me for the remainder of that day, and into the next. Finally, curiosity won out and I decided to try my hand at writing one, to see what came out. Here is what I wrote:
First of all, I want to say that I really enjoyed this life. In fact, it was a great life and I loved it. I hope it lasted well into my 80’s, so that Kathy and I were able to spend a long, long, time together, seeing movies and plays, talking, traveling, and spending time spoiling our grandchildren. I hope I lived long enough to see Sarah and Grace’s graduation from high school and college, and watch Toñito and Nikki’s children grow up. I want to thank you all for coming today and supporting my wife, children, grandchildren, family members, and surviving friends who were able to attend. I hope they’re dealing with my death better than I did with my own father’s. I do apologize for the time and inconveniences my death may have caused, but I appreciate your coming for those I love and leave behind. Having said that, there’s nothing more I want to say about the events of my life. I’m also not qualified to advise you on how to feel happy, safe, or more secure, and less uncertain about death. You are on your own. I’m dead, and the physical tie that bound me to each of you has been severed, and will not be restored. The only temporal part of me that will survive will be your memories, aided sometimes by stories, photographs, and writings. I do, however, have some thoughts about what I learned along the way that I don’t mind sharing.
When I was alive, I was always struck by the importance some people, especially prominent leaders, politicians, businessmen, and wealthy individuals, placed on their legacy. They seemed to confuse the idea of “a good life” as meaning a life, or an inheritance, that is remembered and memorialized by many, many, many people, for a long time. After my few years of living, I finally came to the conclusion that a good life is simply one in which we love, and are loved in return. As the Beatles’ so aptly but it, “love is all you need.” But at the same time, love and a good life doesn’t negate the existence of sorrow, pain, and suffering, either in our own lives, or the world in general. I have experienced a few personal difficulties, sorrows, heartbreaks, and humiliations, but I have witnessed many more terrible tragedies. Those are the harsh trials that make living so hard, and so prompt many people to question the existence of God, and the power of Love. How can a “loving, merciful God allow so much evil, tragedy, and death to exist?” Learning how to answer that question always seemed more important for a happy life, than leaving a historical legacy, or an inheritance, that nations and families would remember.
I suppose I learned a better perspective on a good life and death from Sarah Kathleen, my first granddaughter. I had the wonderful opportunity of babysitting and observing her during the infant years, beginning at 6 months of age. She is my best example of being joyous and living a happy life, without having the slightest fear of sorrow, tragedy, or death. As she grew up, Sarah experienced wonder, awe, and joy every morning we went for a walk. It showed in her face, her eyes, and her voice. I experienced similar flashes of such momentary bliss with my friends Wayne, Jim, and Greg on camping trips to Big Sur; with Kathy, when we walked, hand-in-hand, along beaches during golden sunsets; and driving home in the car with Toñito and Prisa, listening to tales of their days in school. Those moments, which happened too infrequently as I got older, occurred every day to Sarah when we played in the backyard, walked through a garden, or strolled through a park. I watched her eyes light up in wonder at each new sight and sensation – watching butterflies in flight, hummingbirds in midair, and the colorful splendor of flowers, ferns, and blossoms. I watched her discovering the joy of each moment, and seeing the miracles of life that surrounded her, while at the same time knowing that the possibility of injury and death lurked around every corner, and on each street and driveway. A minute’s distraction, a fateful turn of a car, or a driver’s sidelong glances at their cell phone, could precipitate a tragic accident, a terrible injury, or the loss of life. An anomalous germ can be accidently inhaled, a virus ingested, or an infection ignored, triggering a crippling malady, or life-threatening illness. These terrifying thoughts would sometimes flash in my mind as I observed Sarah’s wonderment of life, and dwelling on them could have frightened me into always taking extreme precautions or never letting her out. But these thoughts and images were not real – they were merely illusions, or manifestations, of my fears and uncertainties. Sarah dealt in the real – that was all that surrounded her. She saw The Emperor’s New Clothes for what they were, and did not dwell on what if’s, what might’s, or what should’s. Sarah was a focused participant in each moment. At her age, Sarah had no notions of mortality and death, tragedy or cruelty, these were theoretical concepts she had not been taught, nor yet learned. Cause and effect is an adult paradigm, and parents and educators build upon its foundation. “If you throw a ball up, it will fall to the ground”, is the start. Soon it becomes, “if you throw the ball in any other direction, it might hit someone. Therefore, don’t throw the ball, rock, or stick”. Parents and educators teach such generalizations about reality. We fence in reality. We give it boundaries. We limit life to an accidental and random beginning that comes all too quickly to a harsh and squalid end. However, for three-year old Sarah, life has neither beginning nor end – life is life, a wondrous continuum of joy and bliss, which adults cannot comprehend. So adults formulate generalizations, laws, and norms to control and understand it, and then they create consequences to enforce them.
When Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these”, I think he was referring to this idea. He admonished us to not constrain, nor limit the youthful joys of experiencing and participating in the fullness of life. Children see the realities of the kingdom that surrounds us in life. He was telling us that kids “get it” so stop trying to force their innocent perceptions into contrived adult formulas. Anthony de Mello, the Jesuit priest and spiritual director used the metaphor of “waking up”, to explain the attainment of awareness that yogis, gurus, and mystics reach through their meditative practices. He believed that adults sleep walk through life, completely oblivious to the grace and mystery that surrounds them. Awareness, he said, allows us to finally see and experience the kingdom of heaven. We are already in the midst of its beauty and wonder, every day and every moment, but we lack the eyes to see, the ears to hear, or the nose to sense it. Instead we learn to generalize, define, and explain this existence by logical and scientific methods, thereby remaining asleep and unaware of the Truth. Babies, infants, and small children haven’t learned these adult lessons of living, or the fear of dying, yet. They are only aware of the continuous wonder of life. When Sarah turned 3 ½ years of age, I again saw her in that timeless state of grace when she was dancing in her first recital. Through the eyes of love, I watched Sarah gliding and swaying in harmony with the rhythms of music and movement, and lost to the laws of time and space. For too briefly a time, Sarah was in the kingdom of heaven, and back to that place from which she had sprung. The continuum of life – that is the infinite line of progression on which I believe Sarah, and now her then two-month old sister Grace, are on. They can’t describe it, because it can only be experienced, and not defined.
I’ve also learned to doubt the validity of the adult truism, that there is no more tragic and unjust a death as the loss of a child who “never had the chance to fully experience life”. I wonder if the only thing infants lose by an “early death” is the adult pain of dealing with the death of their children. Despite our ability to measure and quantify life and reality, death is still a concept that adults struggle with – and honestly, so did I. When my father died in 1971, I readily accepted the adult equation, LIFE = BIRTH + DEATH, and I prayed that the Church’s doctrine of resurrection was valid. I’d been to the funerals of my great-grandmother, Granny, and my great-aunt, Tía Tina. I had seen their caskets, and touched their cold faces as they lay in state during their rosaries and funerals. But my father’s death was different. His death caused an irreparable wound in my heart. My dad, the man I loved, trusted, and admired was gone. And yet for many years after, I magically believed he returned. I saw him in cars, driving by me on the freeway, and he visited my dreams in a variety of scenes. Oddly, it was only when I became a father, with children of my own, that these visions stopped. The dreams continued, but the details of my father’s face and mannerisms became hazier and hazier, and less clear and distinct.
The upshot was that for many years after my father’s death, I dreaded going to funerals. I avoided them whenever possible, and when I couldn’t, I hardened my heart to the raw emotions surrounding the proceedings. I numbed myself so well, that upon the passing of my grandparents, I don’t remember feeling anything during their services. Going to funerals was a duty, an obligation, and I separated myself from the grief and anguish that permeated the ceremonies, and which I had once felt after my father’s death. I was successful in this numbing strategy for many years, until the deaths and funerals of my sister-in-law, Debbie, and my mother-in-law, Mary. In a span of 3 years, I watched Kathy and her siblings struggle through the shocking deaths of a sister and mother. Although they continued telling jokes and stories to raise theirs spirits, they were bereft, confused, and in some cases, angry. I did the best I could at being stoic and supportive during both of their funerals, but when I caught sight of my younger brother Eddie at the conclusion of the requiem mass for Mary, I lost it. Feeling that he had taken the time, and come to see me, out of compassion and love, unleashed all of my suppressed emotions and heartaches. I was so relieved and overjoyed to see him, and hug him, at a time of such intense sadness and grief, that I was overwhelmed and I started weeping uncontrollably in his arms. That moment brought to mind a long forgotten scene that took place on the evening of my father’s rosary. I was standing alone, in front of the church, feeling forlorn and abandoned, when out of the darkness emerged my 3 high school friends, Wayne, Jim, and Greg. They came to be with me, to console me, and their presence filled me with joy, humor, and hope. Eddie’s presence, along with the added discovery of my longtime friends John and Kathy O’Riley at the reception, had the same effect. Those encounters reformed my attitude about funerals. I learned that they are not for the dead; they are for the living. It is a rite that helps us progress through the stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance) after the death of a loved one.
Sadly, my own infancy has passed, and I never became a saint or mystic who was aware of the spiritual reality of God’s kingdom on earth. I was simply a man who had the good fortune, or grace, to be loved and to love in return. Growing up, it was only in those brief, blissful moments of joy that I shared with my parents, my brothers and sisters, my friends, my wife, and my children and grandchildren, that I experienced glimpses of the eternal infinity of love and the wonder of God’s world without end. After this funeral, it would be nice to be remembered and occasionally thought of, and talked about, by the people I loved and who loved me. Remembered in the stories you tell, or memories shared by photographs or the words I wrote. But I really don’t care. I have moved on to that place Jesus pointed to in his death and resurrection – that continuum from whence I came that is so often mislabeled heaven or paradise. I am home…
After finishing the first draft of this “Eulogy”, I asked Kathy to read it over. When I spoke with her later, the first thing she said about it was, “It’s not a eulogy”. She was right. I had started writing without any research into what a eulogy should contain. In comparing my efforts against wikiHow’s 5 guidelines, I discovered that I missed the mark entirely! I didn’t keep the tone light and happy. I didn’t aim it at any particular audience. I provided little biographical information about myself, and none of my personal qualities or characteristics. Finally, I wasn’t very concise or well organized. All I did was mention the movie, Fault In Our Stars, and I shared my views on life and death. Upon reflection, I’ve written on this subject before (see tag: death) and it continues being a topic of fear, wonder, and speculation. Obviously, the movie got me thinking about it once again, and I felt the need to write about it. So, please forgive an aging man his ceaseless curiosity about life and death, and his musings about them. I have definitely learned one thing about this experience: I should not be the go-to-guy for any future eulogies, especially my own.
