Random musing on DEATH (read at your own risk!)

[Anubis]

http://anaedo.blog-city.com

Sometimes I let my mind roam. When I do, I find myself pondering some issues. Well, now I am thinking of that cold inevitable destiny of all living flesh—Death. Yes, it is a topic that people shy away from for its transparently gloomy nature. But if we are to fully appreciate each breath, each waking moment then we must make time every now and then to ponder on death. Oh that man could fully understand what lies behind the grey curtains of Mortality! That great veil cast formidably over all living matter! Would that people could experience, even if only briefly the transition brought about by Death!

You see, you've been told that at death, you cease to exist. You've been told that once you breathe your last, and lay down your once proud head in submission to the cold grip of Death, everything about you comes to a final end. You have been told that your body decomposes quickly to nourish the plethora of soil-inhabiting devourers of carrion, and that's where the story ends. But of course, your intelligence rebels against this because you perceive yourself to also be something much more intangible than your material composition; something much more eternal. Your consciousness rebels because you find it difficult to accept that your rational parts will simply get lost—thermodynamic laws or not! Why indeed should life exist—in a world of indescribable pain and suffering one may hasten to add—if Life's teleological imperative is nothing more than Death? And how indeed can you explain to others the great realms you might have traveled to when you allowed yourself to be rid of your mental, static, earth-bound shackles? For indeed, you do realize that you can shut your eye for a moment and be totally transported to vistas grand and indescribable in beauty; and you can also find yourself, complete with your rational and sensory parts, away from scenes of glory into scenes of squalor. With a clarity unfettered by the strictures of contemporary science, you know within yourself that you are part of some undying—though changing—life stream.

Having convinced yourself on your own immortality—a conviction which persists in you despite the familiar taunting of Godless lunatics who would fain be addressed as scientists—you are once again left with the nagging question of why you are apprehensive and unsettled by the idea of death. Yes, that fearsome foe that has in time humbled all tenants of this house of clay! The truth is that no matter how much you try not to think about it, one thing is certain. It is the fact that with time, everything returns to dust; with time, the hair turns grey, and the breasts sag, and the powerful limbs grow weak, and the eyes grow dim. As Death approaches closer and blows his breath on you: your muscles atrophy, and the brain turns to mush and can hardly remember what it has always known. Yes, the beauty fades, the strength is gone. Finally, when Death, like a punctual creditor, knocks at the door of this temporal tabernacle, to collect his due doubtlessly, the indwelling Man, without choice or resistance, links his arm with Death and trudges off into that deep dark unknown.

Your trepidation and unease is magnified when you remember that Death is erratic and indiscriminate in his methods—he may not allow you to draw the first breath, choosing to sling his hook in your nose and claim you right from your mother's womb; he may allow you to emerge from your mother's womb and begin the inevitable race towards your eventual cessation but then he cuts you down viciously when you are still young and ultimately helpless; he may allow you to bloom into youth and just when you are ready to indulge the carnal pleasures of youth, he stealthily creeps behind you and kisses you at the most inauspicious moment. Yes, a lie it is to assume that Death doth always gently draw souls to his frigid embrace!

But I say to you expressly that Death is your friend. Indeed, humanity is like a self-consuming cancer. Mankind is a destructive plague which after wreaking havoc on this terrestrial ball, must be purged. Death is therefore like a quiet friend who helps a drunk, violent and abusive actor exit the grand theatre of Life—with nary a thought to the violent protestations of the actor! It is the great leveler! How horrid this Sorrowful and Suffering Star would be if Death, like a strong but quiet friend, had not acted to rid this realm of destructive clods of kickable matter known as Life!

With this realization, your mind is mollified. Your destiny from birth is death. Your purpose in Life is, in a manner of speaking, to die and possibly be renewed. Every other thing you happen to achieve in the interim is immaterial and pointless; you will not glory in them when your eyes close in death. For what reason then do people fear this renewal which would be ushered in by Death? Has it not occurred to you that you cling to life tenaciously simply because you do not know what you would find at the other side of the great revolving doors? When Death comes, links his hand in yours, like a doting dad marching his chaste daughter down a church aisle, and ushers you into realms of light, does it not occur to you that you would even more tenaciously hold unto that hitherto uncharted Life? Here's the shocker—even if Death ushers you into realms of squalor and gloom, you will equally hold unto that uncharted Life! Why? Because, as in this frail, temporal reality, there are other transitory portals that obtain after this first transition. You are, my dear companion, capable of infinite births, deaths and rebirths! Form may be lost but essence will eventually be preserved as part of the eternal cosmic or transcendental life-stream.

So then, let this third rock from the Sun be dashed to innumerable pieces; let the moon be darkened; let plagues break forth and wipe out mankind; let the beasts of the field form an army and exterminate their human overlords; let the sun perish; let squalid humanity be consumed by the very cancerous nature of their existence; let a million galaxies collide in confused fury; let the universe implode or explode in blazing heat; let the universe spontaneously fragment into smaller universes; let other universes spring forth creating a vaster multiverse. Nevertheless, one constant remains: CHANGE or TRANSITION! His other name is D-E-A-….!

[tomapep]

I always thought that Death was a change of being rather than a termination of same?

Is that from your blog?

[Anubis]

Originally Posted by tomapep

I always thought that Death was a change of being rather than a termination of same?

Is that from your blog?

Oui.

[Drake]

This is a very romanticized notion of death.

Not a criticism, just an observation.

[Anubis]

Originally Posted by Drake

This is a very romanticized notion of death.

Not a criticism, just an observation.

Criticism or observation, all is accepted in good faith here. So, how many people in this House of Hedonism have actually given a serious thought to this issue--that at some point, the back-slapping fun, laughter and pleasure we cherish so much and cling unto would be gone and possibly forgotten? Perhaps, it's too dark, too routine an issue to spare a thought on?