Only Temporary
So there I was in the bathroom in the back of the Gap. My blood was no longer just seeping through my hands. It was everywhere.
Just moments earlier the box cutter had slipped from my hand and pierced my forearm; cutting through an artery. Blood had immediately shot out of my arm like some weird Kill Bill scene.
I didn’t want to turn the bathroom handle because I didn’t want more blood than necessary to seep through the wound; so there I stood trapped in the back bathroom of the Gap, unable to do anything more than wait while everyone on the other side ran around panicking and screaming for someone to call the hospital.
As I waited for someone to free me, the thought of “what if I died because of this?” raced through my head. Surprisingly that prospect didn’t seem as scary as it should. When I thought about death at that moment it seemed like a peaceful dark abyss to let myself fall into. At that moment I felt at ease with where my life was and the God that I believed in. Dying would not be such a bad experience.
There have only been two experiences in my life where I had a serious chance of dying if I didn’t hastily get help or absolve the situation quickly. The only other time where I could’ve almost died, consisted of me choking on a thin round piece of plastic on the bus while my friends laughed at me rather than helping me. They didn’t realize I was actually choking until my body did the only natural thing it could do to fight back: throw up.
I suppose it’s nice knowing that I’m not so much afraid of death. I can’t say that I honestly know what death would look or be like. A few of my friends have died before and come back, but even they can’t remember exactly what it was like. Maybe the essence of what death really is isn’t something that you can just bring back with you like a familiar memory that you can conjure at anytime.
Some people have speculated that your dreams are really just another realm where we live. They believe that once you die, you simply just go on living in your dreams. So essentially once you take the “big dirt nap” you’ll go on dreaming forever. Others believe that once you die that’s it. No more continuation of your existence. Still many religions speak of the continuation of the soul into a heavenly realm. Of coarse, like death, no one can actually say exactly what that place would look or be like.
But still, why do we even need death? “A great deal of our efforts goes into avoiding it. We make extraordinary efforts to delay it and often consider its intrusion a tragic event. Yet we’d find it hard to live without it. Death gives meaning to our lives. It gives importance and value to our time. Time would become meaningless if there was too much of it. If death were indefinitely put off the human psyche would become, well like The Gambler in that Twilight Episode.” ( R.K. On Death, Our Lady Peace, Age of Spiritual Machines)
Now I can’t say that I’ve ever seen that episode of the Twilight Zone but I suppose that if death were indefinitely put off, we’d have no reason to ever do anything. I myself am a huge procrastinator and if I literally had all the time in the world, I’d put things off for years that should really be done in days. Plenty of people would.
So much of what we were taught and how our society operates on is simply survival. “Look both ways before you cross the street!” and then you know there’s the whole Social Darwinism, “Only the strong survive.” Several theories in general would be obsolete if no one ever died. Perhaps maybe if no one ever died there’d be a certain kind of peace in the world since we know we’d have to deal with everyone for the rest of eternity (perhaps that’s why heaven’s supposed to be peaceful?). Or maybe wars would just go on forever without any side gaining anything. Maybe it’d be common procedure for women to get themselves “fixed” so that there’d be no way possible for them to have children once the world reaches a certain population number. The issue of humanic (yes, I did just make up that word, and I like it) over crowding would probably be up there with global warming. But then again if death were not an issue, maybe we wouldn’t have even made it past the cave man era. If death were not an issue the human race would not function or look the way we do. After all the only reason why our bodies repair themselves is for survival; for the hope of a longer life. Yes, we’d still be around. But every cut, broken bone, and illness would still be there. We would be the walking dead. And really, even if that wasn’t true, once you get up around a hundred, you’re not doing so well any more. Would you really want to be a few hundreds or thousands of years old? In theory, to continue to exist at that age would be pure torture. Just because you live forever does not promise you eternal youth.
I suppose many people would disagree with me, but then again this all just speculation. I can’t say for sure what could happen, but it seems likely to me that the way things are and the way we live would completely change.
To me, the more I think about it, death is really a gift of sorts. This world is a pretty shitty place and seems to be getting a little worse every day. To be able to escape it and have the chance of possibly going on to something new and better is exciting. Sure the way we die is sometimes pretty horrible, but I think when we reach the point of realizing that we’re dying we accept it and go peacefully.
Just moments earlier the box cutter had slipped from my hand and pierced my forearm; cutting through an artery. Blood had immediately shot out of my arm like some weird Kill Bill scene.
I didn’t want to turn the bathroom handle because I didn’t want more blood than necessary to seep through the wound; so there I stood trapped in the back bathroom of the Gap, unable to do anything more than wait while everyone on the other side ran around panicking and screaming for someone to call the hospital.
As I waited for someone to free me, the thought of “what if I died because of this?” raced through my head. Surprisingly that prospect didn’t seem as scary as it should. When I thought about death at that moment it seemed like a peaceful dark abyss to let myself fall into. At that moment I felt at ease with where my life was and the God that I believed in. Dying would not be such a bad experience.
There have only been two experiences in my life where I had a serious chance of dying if I didn’t hastily get help or absolve the situation quickly. The only other time where I could’ve almost died, consisted of me choking on a thin round piece of plastic on the bus while my friends laughed at me rather than helping me. They didn’t realize I was actually choking until my body did the only natural thing it could do to fight back: throw up.
I suppose it’s nice knowing that I’m not so much afraid of death. I can’t say that I honestly know what death would look or be like. A few of my friends have died before and come back, but even they can’t remember exactly what it was like. Maybe the essence of what death really is isn’t something that you can just bring back with you like a familiar memory that you can conjure at anytime.
Some people have speculated that your dreams are really just another realm where we live. They believe that once you die, you simply just go on living in your dreams. So essentially once you take the “big dirt nap” you’ll go on dreaming forever. Others believe that once you die that’s it. No more continuation of your existence. Still many religions speak of the continuation of the soul into a heavenly realm. Of coarse, like death, no one can actually say exactly what that place would look or be like.
But still, why do we even need death? “A great deal of our efforts goes into avoiding it. We make extraordinary efforts to delay it and often consider its intrusion a tragic event. Yet we’d find it hard to live without it. Death gives meaning to our lives. It gives importance and value to our time. Time would become meaningless if there was too much of it. If death were indefinitely put off the human psyche would become, well like The Gambler in that Twilight Episode.” ( R.K. On Death, Our Lady Peace, Age of Spiritual Machines)
Now I can’t say that I’ve ever seen that episode of the Twilight Zone but I suppose that if death were indefinitely put off, we’d have no reason to ever do anything. I myself am a huge procrastinator and if I literally had all the time in the world, I’d put things off for years that should really be done in days. Plenty of people would.
So much of what we were taught and how our society operates on is simply survival. “Look both ways before you cross the street!” and then you know there’s the whole Social Darwinism, “Only the strong survive.” Several theories in general would be obsolete if no one ever died. Perhaps maybe if no one ever died there’d be a certain kind of peace in the world since we know we’d have to deal with everyone for the rest of eternity (perhaps that’s why heaven’s supposed to be peaceful?). Or maybe wars would just go on forever without any side gaining anything. Maybe it’d be common procedure for women to get themselves “fixed” so that there’d be no way possible for them to have children once the world reaches a certain population number. The issue of humanic (yes, I did just make up that word, and I like it) over crowding would probably be up there with global warming. But then again if death were not an issue, maybe we wouldn’t have even made it past the cave man era. If death were not an issue the human race would not function or look the way we do. After all the only reason why our bodies repair themselves is for survival; for the hope of a longer life. Yes, we’d still be around. But every cut, broken bone, and illness would still be there. We would be the walking dead. And really, even if that wasn’t true, once you get up around a hundred, you’re not doing so well any more. Would you really want to be a few hundreds or thousands of years old? In theory, to continue to exist at that age would be pure torture. Just because you live forever does not promise you eternal youth.
I suppose many people would disagree with me, but then again this all just speculation. I can’t say for sure what could happen, but it seems likely to me that the way things are and the way we live would completely change.
To me, the more I think about it, death is really a gift of sorts. This world is a pretty shitty place and seems to be getting a little worse every day. To be able to escape it and have the chance of possibly going on to something new and better is exciting. Sure the way we die is sometimes pretty horrible, but I think when we reach the point of realizing that we’re dying we accept it and go peacefully.
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