An unexpected knock came at our door on Father’s Day. I opened the door just a crack, as our dog Mango is big and high-energy when new people first arrive.
“I want to congratulate the fathers…” said the man at the door. This was my first father’s day being a father myself, so part of me wanted to let him in, but I was wary.
“I’m sorry sir. I can’t talk right now,” I said as Mango barked and jumped behind me.
“That’s OK,” he said, and handed me some papers before I closed the door.
I looked at the the first paper in my hand:
I was suddenly grateful that Mango’s rambunctiousness gave me an excuse not to engage with the man. But as I thought more about him, I realized that his tracts were more than just propaganda, they were things I deeply wanted to believe: Part of me wants to not die, to live without pain or sadness, to be able to enjoy life forever. I want to do all the fun things without having to choose. It’s no fun waving goodbye to the ghost ships that I want to sail on, but can’t.
“These teachings are silly,” said my wife. “The Buddha said: suffering is a part of life.” And the pamphlets contradict the Stoics, who said: Memento mori.
I found this beautiful post on Reddit, by someone who left Jehovah’s Witnesses:
In a weird way my life greatly improved in its quality after thinking about my own mortality.
I’ve also been opened minded about what comes after death – many people believe many different things. There could be life after it ? Who’s to say; certainly not me.
I will tell you one thing though, my health and wellbeing have really taken top priority now. The prospect of death has really taught me one thing, I love living. And I hope to live into my elder years. A gift I’m giving to my 80yo self, as a 32yo, is fitness. So I can live as independently and comfortably as possible.
I didn’t really prioritise this before because I truly believed the end would come long before I had to deal with a head full of white hairs. But now, I want desperately to have those white hairs – and I want to raise a beautiful family and watch that grow into more and more people to love.
And yes maybe it is true that we live and we die. But a part of us can live on through the hearts of those who love us. Maybe the traditions I start now will live on through the generations, maybe my great granddaughter will sit on a stoop outside on Christmas Day with her children eating salted caramels before breakfast because that reminds her of what she would do with her mum, because that’s what I do now.
I think for me personally I realised I wasn’t afraid of death as such. I was afraid of looking back and seeing a life that I didn’t properly live. To realise I didn’t look around enough and see the beauty. Didn’t take the opportunity to love loudly and boldly.
In a strange way, it was life it self that helped me process death. Because it made me ask myself for the first time, what kind of life would I be proud to leave behind.
Death really is the mother of all existential pains. Believing in death means believing in loss, believing in the finitude of life. I remember talking to my therapist one day about how I didn’t cry when my grandpa Abraham died, nor after a breakup. I shared my sadness at hearing David Berman’s song lyric:
I asked the painter why the roads were colored black / He said Steve it’s because people leave and there’s no highway to bring them back
“It’s making me wonder about how you process loss,” my therapist said.
Her use of that word — loss — put a fine focus on what I had been avoiding. I hadn’t been grieving properly in my life. Part of me held onto the belief that somewhere, someday, I’d be reunited with Abraham and my ex again.
I want to believe in the tracts that the JW man left with me, but I can’t. So the only thing to do, I suppose, is to feel it all. Feel the grief in losing people and opportunities, and one day, my own life. And also, to enjoy it. To go for a run and prioritize fitness so that one day, my hair can hopefully be completely grey (it’s greying now). To drink my tea in the morning (my version of salted caramels). To look at the clouds in the mountains and say: hell yes, I get to be here.
danscreativeoulet 