Dead End

The day before yesterday, Bins father-in-law passed away. He was around 67 years old & suffered from Parkinson’s. Yesterday I found out that a neighbour who we lived opposite to our apartment for 23 years had passed away. Mr. Jalal, a Pakistani national, maybe around 50 years of age, complained of feeling uneasy in the morning. Not heeding his wife’s advice of consulting the doctor next door to his office, he drove all the way to a hospital. He was found dead in his car infront of the emergency building entrance.

The above is actually my secret nightmare. Dying in the middle of nowhere. When I used to go to work there was this huge main road with 4 lanes that I crossed everyday.......the zebra crossing was 5 minutes away, the sun was too hot & I was always running late. So it was easier to cut across…..I would wait to find a break in the traffic & run across, carefully ofcourse. Running across a main road is actually a traffic offense here but since there were no visible policemen around many of us did this to save time. But everyday while cutting across the road this thought would cross my mind “What if some vehicle hit me & I died today??? Nobody would know who I am. I could be lying in a pool of blood & my family will have no idea.”

Till the age of 30 I hardly gave death a thought. Death happened to old people. Whenever I heard that somebody was suffering from cancer or kidney failure I would wonder why people had to suffer so much. Why couldn’t death be quicker???
But now at the age of 35 when I hear that a 38 year old died of a heart-attack or a 45 year old died of cancer I have this vague feeling of panic. 35 is not so far away from 38 or 45. Death was no longer something which happened to very old or sick people.

Frankly speaking, Death scares me. It is so final. I wonder what goes on in the minds of people who suffer from incurable illnesses like cancer & Aids???? Where do they get the courage to live knowing that they are soon going to be buried under the earth or charred to ashes???? How do they feel about having no say…no choice about their living, or should I say dying?????
I was so upset when I watched the video of the Last lecture by Randy Pausch. When I see dead bodies of little children in Iraq in the newspapers I’m filled with anguish. I want to hold my children tightly & not let them out of my sight. When Winnie blogs about her mother who passed away I feel so terrible for her that I sit there for ages wondering what I could write to console her….. but I know no words of comfort can obliterate the grim truth that her mother is no more, which inturn reminds me that my parents are growing old. I didn’t feel so bad when my grandfather passed away at 98 but when I hear of people, even strangers dying in their prime I’m terribly upset. Even death scenes in movies & soaps depress me…..especially when the protagonist pleads that he doesn’t want to die.

Long back when I was blogging from Windows Live Spaces I used to visit the blog page of a Pakistani teenager, living in London. I don’t have the link otherwise I would have put it here. She was very attached to her father & had watched him die in front of her eyes. A few weeks after his death she put up a heart-breaking post on what happens to a body after it is buried. Till then I had no clue & infact didn’t even want to know what happened to dead bodies. That post was terrible….her anguish at her inability to save her father from death & the graphic descriptions of after-death deterioration were horrifying. I know I can google & get it but I don’t want to. I just cant bear to do it.

Religions give us hope of a beautiful place like Heaven & actions like rebirth. But I find no solace in any of them. This is where I question my faith in the Lord???? If I really believed in the Father I should be comfortable about going back to him. But I’m not.
Does anybody know what really happens????? All I know is that if I die I’ll be taken away from my family…….my parents & husband will be inconsolable & my children will be bereft. And I………I don’t want to go anywhere, period!!!!!

Then again I think.....maybe as we grow older our mind also grows & accepts death like how we embrace all the other stages in our lives. At first the people around are shattered but gradually they pick up the threads again. The dead person finds a place on the wall. And Life goes on.

Have I spooked you with this post????? Actually was not planning to write a post of this kind at all. Its a topic I generally am content to push under the carpet. I just concentrate on living Life on a day-to-day basis. Its only when I’m confronted with bad news, all these depressing thoughts come & make me feel terrible. Didnt mention it earlier but even the Air France tragedy sort of contributed towards all these morbid contemplations.

Is there anybody who shares these kind of thoughts?????
Or maybe a different point of view??????