Latter Than Sooner

What better way to slip out of this world than in one’s sleep? There is no guarantee, of course, it will happen that way with me. Still what harm in hoping? Yet it has benefits, like outsmarting death that likes to surprise a victim by coming up from behind, so-to-speak, and tapping one’ s houlder when least expected. Another is the interminable waiting and not knowing exactly how, when, or where it will happen. (A good friend of mine died while on the commode!) Best of all, it’s not having to suffer, to linger, waiting for the thread of life to stretch until it breaks, and not having to endure the dumb stares of family huddled around the bed, (or if an accident, surrounded by doctors and nurses administering some sort of life support) – tongue-tied, squeezing out well-intentioned sugar-coated words dressed in optimistic but illusionary hopes – a fast unexpected recovery, or better still though most unlikely and absurd, a miracle. Another bonus, the absence of a clergyman with his abracadabra and hocus pocus and formulaic prayers which have never yet (to my knowledge, at least) forestalled Death’s determined stride one second nor weakened its determination, nor soften its bite, all of which only comforts (if at all) the living who have come to see you off as though on a voyage of a lifetime, which dying is, couched in a metaphor so stale it smells from over use. Still it’s a chilling fact that no one in the tight circle of my family and relations has ever died in their sleep – at least so far. So it’s a slim chance I will, and though my heart is less than happy at the prospect, still, I’m taking no chances – I’m braced for that unwanted shoulder tap. Are you?