Degrees of Death

We all know that death is our final destination, but the last road we take before we get there is what I've been thinking about today. Whether it's a long painful bout with a terminal disease or a space station falling on top of your head without you ever seeing it coming, it's still the same end. So why do we fear different types of death? Myself, I can sit here and think that to step into the path of a bullet to protect a loved one might be an instinctive reaction, and to sit here and think about it isn't something that would send me into a panicky state, but to think I might have a blood clot in my body at this very minute that could break loose and go to my brain killing me or turning me into a vegetable - dependent on others to care for me - is something that scares me if I let it. And what of the idea of a worldwide cataclysmic event, an end-of-the-world happening? That sort of thing terrifies me. Why? Why more so than my own, singular demise? Maybe it's the way I'm programmed, what with my anxiety and all, or maybe it goes deeper. Maybe the end of mankind is a terror that is inbred in all of us because it means that all our generations of accomplishments will be for naught. But still....what will we care if we are to die anyway, probably before that happens? Maybe it means that we really are living for something more than our own selfish existence, which means that ultimately our works during our lifetimes are leading to something really ... special.

The older I get the more I think about these things and the more fearful I become of death, but also the more unafraid I am of it. No, I can't explain that statement. Maybe I should say that I'm closer to accepting death... Yeah that might be what I'm wanting to say.

I'm really not at the age where I should be thinking about dying, but maybe it's a change of life
thing. They say you do a lot of crazy stuff when you go through the change, like getting a younger woman to make you feel young. Hmm.. maybe I'll make that next on my agenda.