A Few Words About My Death

John Donne, one of the most famous Metaphysical Poets. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I died last night. It doesn’t matter how I died or why because I am gone. Nothing more than the memories of a person who once was and thoughts of who I could have been. This is not supposed to be dramatic. I am not looking for attention or asking for people to come racing after me because I am gone. It is up to those who loved me to determine how to best remember me.

Don’t come looking for answers to that question from me because I am not going to give them to you. I can’t tell you how to remember me or what you should do. Ok, that is not entirely accurate I can give you specific directions on what I want to see happen and who I want to manage it all, but I won’t.

I won’t do it because I think that this is one of those situations in which more is gained by experience than by being told what to do. It reminds me of that stupid comment where people say that you don’t have to visit the sun to know that it is hot. That is true but it doesn’t really tell you all that much about what the sun is really like. It gives you a basic overview of it but no real understanding of what life is like there.

This blog  is a collection of my thoughts, feelings and ideas about life. If you read it you will learn much about me. You will gain many insights about who I was and what kind of person I tried to be. But you won’t get it all. You won’t know the little things that made me into the person that I was. You won’t know what kind of face I made when I was happy or sad. You’ll never know about the twinkle in my eye or the way that my lip curled. You will have to rely upon the words of the few that knew me. You’ll have to look to them to help flesh out what can’t be seen here.

My children will be able to tell you thousand stories about me. They know so much more about me than they realize. They see things that only children see in fathers, both good and bad. They’ll tell you stories that are worth listening to because in those stories they’ll share insights into them and me. And though they are very much their own persons those insights will help you to see hints of me inside them. The physical evidence is easy. You look at them and you can see my genetic contribution to their appearance but there are other things to experience.

That is not supposed to sound narcissistic or egocentric. It is tied into my beliefs and comments about how in some ways the dead keep living. It is those little quirks and habits that we pass down from father to son to grandson that I am referring to. I am reminded of days long past where I would sit with my father and grandfather and people would remark on how we all made the same gesture. Perhaps that was learned or maybe it is genetic, I don’t really know. I don’t think that it really matters all that much.

As I sit here staring at the screen I wonder what else there is to say and whether I should say it. It is a funny thing because I have rarely been one to suffer from writer’s block or to be speechless. Words have always been among my most faithful companions and though they haven’t always done what I asked them to, they never failed to appear.

Yet, I sit here and wonder if there is a point and a purpose to writing more. Would ten million words tell the tale that I want told of would they still fall short.  Had I lived to be a thousand years it wouldn’t have been enough time for me. There were always ten thousand things to see and places to visit. Read my words and you’ll see that one of many dreams would have been to live long enough to become an expert in many different fields. You’d see that I wanted to be able to live in places long enough to become a native and not just a tourist passing through.

Well, not every dream is made to be realized and so it goes. Still a life worth living is one in which you never stop fighting to live your dreams and not dream your life.

Now it really is time to go. Go live your dreams and perhaps I’ll see you on the other side.

Death Be Not Proud- John Donne

“Death be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not soe,
For, those, whom thou think’st, thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill mee.
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee,
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,
Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwell,
And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well,
And better then thy stroake; why swell’st thou then?
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.”