The Door

Last night I received a phone call from a friend.
It was already quite late and I was just going to bed, my mouth still tingly and minty-fresh from toothpaste.
When the voice on the other end asked “How are you?” I answered with one of my normally extremely gay and sprightly witticisms (and by gay, let the record show that I mean “happy”)... at any rate, suffice it to say that the person on the other end, was NOT gay at all. Not happy.
She had called to tell me that her dad, who went into the hospital this week, had sort of taken a wee turn for the worse, and she had just found out about it.
Today, he was scheduled to go for one of these CAT scans? Is it CAT or KAT? I am not sure.
So.... I abandoned my witticisms for the time being, and expressed my regret that such an eventuality had.... eventualized.
[I am terrible in these situations, I really am... I never quite know what to say...]
The reason I am terrible is because I am way too realistic.
Now before I go on too far here, I want to throw in a bit of a disclaimer. This blog is going to sound as though I am very unsympathetic or unempathetic, or that I myself am very pathetic, when it comes to the plight of others.
That would be a misconception. I never ever belittle the seriousness of physical affliction.
I myself hate pain. I detest illness in myself, and I hate to see or even hear of any sort of pain, discomfort, or loss of dignity, that comes from any sort of sustained illness.... regardless of who it is that is suffering, much less people that I personally know and love.
I even do not like the discussion of the “redemptive” properties of illness.
Phewie!
I would rather discuss the redemptive properties of WELLNESS.... thank you!

My own father passed away in 1999 after a lengthy illness and to see how this once powerful, strong, robust man.... this person whom I suppose I loved most in the world, dwindled away and was in agony and discomfort, both physically and mentally, well, suffice it to say, never shall I belittle, or make light of the illness of any person.
So.... that is not what this blog is about.
What this blog is about is how much illness SURPRISES us.
SHOCKS us.
When we hear of it afflicting a dear loved one, we can almost react at times as if, until this point, we had no idea any such thing as illness existed. We thought we were immune to it.
This is exactly what I was listening to, on the phone last night.

She was extremely traumatized. Knew she was not going to be able to sleep, and probably would not be able to go to work the next day. (Today). These things are completely understandable.
But she kept saying... repeatedly, and I mean, REPEATEDLY.... “He can’t be sick. He just can’t. He can’t be sick.”
And I would say.... “Uh huh. I hear you.... it’s terribly unfortunate...”
But no, she wanted to clarify... “No, you don’t get what I am saying. I mean, he CANNOT be sick. I am not going to be able to get through this.”

This is where I begin to be extremely useless on my end of the phone.

Because see.... I desperately want to say... “No, that is where you are wrong. He CAN be sick. In fact he IS sick....”
But I don’t say that.
I try to make her see it without me saying it.... so I ask... “Uh huh. Yeah. How old is your dad now?”
[Before you complain to me for too long about your car, I want to know something about the mileage on it, at least......]
“I don’t know,” she says. “Somewhere in his seventies.”
[My own father, a formerly healthy ox of a man passed away from rather severe mechanical breakdown at age 73.... so this is in my mind as I wonder what to say...again, I am TOLSTOY when it comes to this Ivan Ilyich-ian realism....]
And I choose to say..... “Well you know. When we are in our seventies, I mean, the body is getting up there in years.... and.... maybe you are over-reacting. Maybe they will find that there is not all that much wrong.....”
“You just don’t get it,” she fires back (literally angry).... “He can’t be sick.

See, I sat there (in silence) and realized that what she was really saying is that she does not want to allow her father to be sick.
He can’t do this to HER. Not NOW and stuff!
I am not saying that her honest love for her father is diminished by this perspective she has of the situation, not at all, but I am saying that his illness is not about her. And this is what she must remember. His illness is about him, and she needs to allow for this, in her heart and in her mind.
And I cannot help but think that the SURPRISE factor is to blame for a lot of the intensity of reaction on this issue.
“But he was so healthy last month... last WEEK even!”
And all I can think of saying is.... “Uh huh? Aaaaaaaaand?.......”

If I receive a phone call tonight that informs me that my mother, (also in her seventies), whom I dearly love with all my heart, has just been rushed to the hospital and is incoherent and no one quite knows what is exactly wrong with her yet.... if I receive that call tonight [my mother is a couple of thousand miles away]... I will have a myriad of reactions.
But not one of them will be utter shock and surprise.
Why?
Well, mostly because I am already expecting that phone call. It will not arrive on the wings of impossibility.
Not one of my reactions will be like those of my friend last night, who is literally incapacitated right now.... which is another way of saying “in a state of shock.”
It is like a boulder has landed on her, and she cannot get out from under it.
I feel bad for her, but all day long I have been wondering WHY THIS SITUATION DEVELOPS.
Is there something that can prevent it? Some attitude we can adopt?

I do not pretend to know that I have the answer to that question. In fact, I know that I do not, because all people are different, and they react differently to bad news and/or tragedy.
A plethora of specific factors go into this reaction.
But the surprise factor.
It is intrigueing me. I think it is important.

Those who know me, know that I think about death a real lot.
In some people’s cosmology, this would be utterly depressing. What I mean is that for them, it would be utterly depressing to adopt such a sort of vigilance about illness and death.
I read about it, I think about it, I conjecture what it may be like.... ALL THE TIME!
It is the way I am set up.
There are some people who are the complete opposite. I talked with one of them on the phone last night! Ummmm... it is an enlightening experience!
It would be very difficult for someone to convince me that the attitude opposite of mine (where you go just about NUTS when there is even the possible HINT of a threat of illness and/or death)... is somehow more healthy.
In other words, this opposite attitude (from mine) is to NEVER.... and I mean NEVER think of illness and/or the death that will result from illness.
[And let’s face it, few of us are going to die in that way we all want to... while making love!]

Here is the theory some people have about death:
If we never think of it, we will at least not be in angst about it when the day arrives.
I do not believe in this theory whatsoever.
The reason I say that is twofold. Firstly, everyone I know who has this attitude (including my friend last night on the phone) nearly has a nervous breakdown when they are confronted with death and/or impending death and/or words that rhyme with death, and stuff like that.
Secondly, myself.... a person who constantly thinks about death, I have gone through experiences in the midst of death, and I have been remarkably stable throughout the ordeal.
For example, I gave the eulogy at my father’s funeral.
But, according to what my friend was telling me last night, she will not even be AT the funeral if her dad has one, because she is going to kill herself if he dies!
But I feel.... (don’t get me wrong here... I did not DO it, but I feel like saying)... “How long do you expect him to live? Till he is a hundred and fourteen? Or till YOU die of old age yourself?”
It is simply unrealistic!
It is unfair to not let the old man be ill.

In a related sort of scenario, I remember seeing the newspapers in the first week of April, this year.
Every front page, for days.... was strewn with images of people weeping their heads off because The Pope had finally passed away.
And [if this sounds disrespectful, please, I intend no disrespect] we all love[d] The Pope, but let's face it, he had come to a point in his life where he was desperately ill.
If there is anything to Christianity whatsoever, then it should have been seen as a merciful and even beautiful thing, that he died. His suffering ended. The end of a wonderful, accomplished life.
Would we be more pleased if the man were animated with strings and pulleys when he could no longer walk on his own? Are we that selfish? Could we not let him go?
Would we have even chosen one of our pets to have stayed alive another day, were they in a similar state?
Is it any different (this whole agony over the Pope’s death) from my friend saying, of her father.... “He can’t die!” [??]
The reality of it is this. Yes he CAN! And furthermore, he WILL!
If not as a result of the present situation he is facing, then surely it will be the result of another one a few years down the road, or sooner.
Just as I may not even make it home from this coffee shop tonight without being.... deadened somehow..

Here is MY image of the actual scenario. Purely figurative, and speculative. Yet I think it is also the scenario of every single person reading this blog.
[WARNING: If this whole sort of “reality-discussion” bothers you, you should quit reading this right now and I’m not even kidding, really...]

I picture an enormous elongated Hallway, at the far end of which is a chair.
At this near end of the Hallway, is a Door.
I am there (here) on this side of the door, and I cannot see into the Hallway.
Death is in that hallway, and has been there, in MY hallway, ever since I drew my first breath, way back in the winter of 1963.
[I’m going to call Death a “he” now, but chances are about equal that she’s a “she”...]
He [Mr. Death] has long ago already gotten up out of his chair, and started his determined walk towards the Door, the Door behind which I stand, living my life.
Even though (as I have described) for most of my adulthood I have had a real propensity to be profoundly aware of that Door, I have also strayed far and wide and blissfully forgotten all about it. Several events though (serious accidents, mostly) have reminded me of the Door, from time to time.
And all the while, he, Mr. Death is walking.
Only he knows how long the Hallway is. I don’t. I can’t see through the Door.
But one way of the other [he has never missed a single person who has ever lived on the earth, even Jesus stood at this Door] he will make it come to pass, even if it is in the blink of of an eye, that I will be made aware of nothing else, except that Door.

And then he will knock. He’s going to ask for me.
If I hesitate, stay real quiet, will he go away?
No.
If I get angry, and yell, will he get scared and leave?
No. Not in most cases anyway.
Well..... I don’t get it. What does he wait for? For me to open the Door? What an Idiot... I’m not opening that damn Door. I refuse. If he wants me to go with him he’ll have to open the Door himself.
Well, actually, sometimes he does. That is, if he feels like being merciful.
What do you mean, merciful?
Well, by merciful, I mean that the only other option is usually much, much worse.
What is it? What is the other option?

He outwaits you.

My God!
This is the most disgusting blog I have ever read in my life!
Is it?
Yes... anyone who lives with this sort of morbid image before them night and day would be horribly depressed... and some sort of... basket case.... frightened.... afraid.... a freakin' lunatic.

Hmm... that is an interesting perspective.
Because see... I DO live with this very real image before me at all times, and I have not lived even one single day in “depression” in my life, nor am I in angst about life OR death.
There is not one single person that knows me that would describe me as being sad, or depressed, or morbid, or gloomy, or morose, or in any way moribund.
If anything, I am the living epitome of the opposite of all of these adjectives.
So.... for me, this is how I come to terms with the inevitable.
For those of you who did not want to read my figurative scenario, (but did).... let me say something even worster now.....

You WILL open that door.
You..... WILL!
And I will too!
And everyone you and I love, will open it too, either before or after we do!
If you are breathing air and reading this, The Hypothetical Dude has long since left the chair in that Hallway, and he is walking towards you. And walking towards me.
The way I cope with this reality, is to not be in denial of the possibilities.
Knowing that I could receive some sort of prognosis TOMORROW about some sort of terminal problem with my innards, only makes me appreciate TODAY all the more, not less!

And now.... a word about The Hallway.
See, I will not belabor this point. The “death” thing sounds pretty horrid huh?
Yeah.... sure does. Boo-hoo.... me can’t live none more!
But let me ask you something.... let’s move on back to Pope John Paul II again.
Seriously, given that you believe in some sort of afterlife in the first place.... do you really think that the Pope would want to be back in his body today?
The body that was wracked with pain and decrepitude and is [now] decayed?
I think not.
How about his youthful, good body, before the serious mileage, like?
Nope. I thinketh not.
Again, all of this hinges upon there being an afterlife, which happens to be something I firmly believe in, by faith, I guess.
OK, if Pope John Paul II doesn’t want to be back in his body again, why should I want him to be there?
For me? My benefit?
If so, than let us at least be honest about the fact that our tears for him are entirely motivated by selfishness.
I once wrote a poem along these lines, about the Bible’s story of the raising of Lazarus in John chapter 11.
I called it Her Selfish Grief, and it is so brief that I will place it here for your consideration:

Her Selfish Grief

Four days his shell lay Bethany-bound
When rang the Martha prompted sound
“Come forth”… She truly sorrowed when
Unwrapped, he wished to die again.

But I digress, sort of. [Always looking for an excuse to put a poem out there....]
The thing is, I believe that bliss awaits us on the other side, I really do.
And the Door opens onto the Hallway wherein we are ushered into The Rest of the Place!

You know.... by an incredible serendiptous coincidence, as I thought of these things today, around lunchtime I picked a book out of my backpack, and looked at it. A friend had sent me this book. It is William Stafford’s poems, in the collection called The Darkness Around Us Is Deep.
In one section, Stafford focuses on his native American Indian roots. And as I read his poem entitled People of the South Wind, I was captivated by the simplicity of the wonderful things he was saying in the second stanza. [May the poet forgive me for extracting only this portion of his poem.]

Your breath has a little shape –
you can see it cold days, Well,
every day it is like that, even in summer.
Well, your breath goes, a whole
army of little shapes. They are living
in the woods now and are your friends.
When you die – well, you go with
your last breath and find the others.
And in open places in the woods
all of you are together and happy.

Look at how many times the word “well” appears. It gives these lines an innocent sort of mixture of surety and wonder.... an attempt at describing the ineffable.
It is no more meant to be literally perceived as is my Hallway analogy, or my own little poem.... and yet, I cannot think of a more wonderful way of describing what probably happens when we, one day, open the Door.
********