Too Soon Gone: The Right Age To Die…
What do you say? “I’m sorry” seems so lame. And yet that’s what we all feel. That’s what we all say to the family of the deceased. Feelings swell like a tide and engulf us, filling every void, forcing words into hiding.
Marge was 53. Aside from being well fed like so many of us, she had no real health problems … at least none that anyone knew about. Expired in the middle of the night in her sleep. No warning. No nothing. Just died.
Not wanting to be the first to arrive at the funeral home for visitation with the family, we held back and arrived about 20 minutes after the announced start time. Pulling into the overflowing parking lot I remarked that the funeral business certainly wasn’t dead. Poor joke. Bad taste. They must have several clients here this weekend. After finally making a parking slot where there was not supposed to be one, we walked around to the front where one of the cordial funeral home mannequins directed us to a side entrance for the visitation.
On returning to bed after a middle of the night trip to the bathroom, Ben sensed that something was not right. That’s when he discovered his wife of 36 years … already gone.
Over the years I have been to more funeral home visitations than I want to think about. Never have I seen anything like this. The line waiting to get into to the large visitation room wound from the lobby to the far end of the hallway and back. Conservatively 300 to 400 people standing, shuffling uncomfortably from foot to foot, inching along. Once inside the room, there were several dozen, maybe as many as another hundred, waiting to get to the receiving line of family at the far end. And more still coming. It was going to be a long wait.
Ben and his company have been my network support customer for about 10 years. Several times I had met Marge, both in their home, and at the business. She loved to cook and entertain so she was likely to show up with enough salad, sandwiches, casseroles, and desserts to feed the entire staff — and did so frequently. On those occasions when I was lucky enough to be onsite working on a project for them, she forced me in to the break room for lunch (my arm twists easily when there is good food involved) and treated me like family. In fact, I often thought of them as a kind of extended family.
Ben grabbed and hugged me – a big bear-hug. As he pulled away he started talking. “We were married for 36 wonderful years. I have so many memories – 36 years of wonderful memories. That’s all that’s left now, that and my three great kids here with me. But that’s enough to get me through … 36 years…36…” His voice trailed off with a telltale sign of fatigue. After a sincere “I’m sorry” and “Anything I can do for you, just ask”, I moved along to offer condolences to the three young adults who found themselves suddenly mother-less.
Marge’s passing was within a couple of days of two other tragic young deaths. Dana Reeve, surviving spouse of Christopher Reeve, succumbed to lung cancer at the age of 44. The nation and world had witnessed her perseverance and bravery in caring for her very own personal Superman during the years he fought the crippling paralysis resulting from a tragic accident. Then there was Kirby Puckett, much loved former Minnesota Twins baseball player and Hall of Famer, lost at 45 to a stroke. The barrel shaped Puckett wore a permanent smile, was perennially jovial, and always had a sincere kind word for others. In a sports world tarnished by greed, drugs, and uncivil behavior, Kirby was a shining role model to be admired.
Death at a young age always gets our attention and sympathy and begs an unanswerable “Why?” Is death any less tragic, does it deserve less attention, if it happens at 70 or 80 or even 90? What is it about loss of life before one is finished with living that shakes us so? What is the right age to die? Many of us think of dying as a part of living — the inevitable end of life — and some of us do not face it with the crippling fear that grips others. Some view it as a passing from one life, one form of existence, to another. Others are quite certain that death is the end of existence. Watching elders with horribly debilitating, incurable ailments, as their families struggle to survive emotionally and financially, is every bit as heart rending as seeing them deal with the shock of sudden death of a young loved one.
These questions have been pondered and debated since we stood upright, gazed at the stars, and started thinking about life, about what it all means. Obviously, I have no answers. I do have opinions. I do have preferences as to my eventual fate. Bottom line, I want to live until I die, then pass quickly. Like my Dad did. And whether that be tonight or 30 years from now, for me, a quick exit is far preferable to a slow, lingering, agonizing death.
Rest in peace, all who pass this way, whether with us for an instant or a long lifetime.
What do you think? How do you feel?
14 Comments so far
Beautifully written, Winston. And hauntingly appropriate as I mourn the death of my former classmate, Tom Fox. Thanks.
Thank you MaryB. And RIP Tom Fox… where ever you are…
I haven’t lost anyone for a couple months now, but it’s amazing: the size of the holes in my life that death has left in its wake. I am not afraid of my own death, but I worry alot about losing my loved ones. They are what gives my life real meaning, without my family and friends I would be so alone.. I can’t imagine what I would do by myself. I am blessed to be loved by many, and each individual is so precious to me. That’s what sucks about death– it seems like it ends relationships. Suddenly someone just isn’t there any more.
Winston, there were so many turns of phrase, so many points where you made the words transparent; this is a strong writing, and I wonder what more of you has been left off the page. Maybe, more accurately, the bit I feel beyond the words is me. I lost my father when he was 55, and I never have believed I had an obligation to stay here longer than he did. I still feel that way (I just passed 52). At the time of his death, people commented about his youth, how sad it was to lose someone so young, and I was always confused by the thought. At 26 I thought my world would end without him. As you’ve said here, isn’t losing someone to death sad regardless the age? I follow sadness to a seat at the event, and I see myself finding sadness and pain most because I have to live now without him - I have to fill in too many blanks, and for the most part, I would be glad to trade places. My father got the best part of the deal, even if his ticket out was with lung cancer - a then worse way to go than it still is today. …and I lost myself there, and your words invited me in. There is the power of knowing that welcomes identification. You had me all the way through.
One other note … I’ve been so under the pressure of papers and deadlines that I hadn’t caught the news of Kirby Puckett’s death. Thanks for keeping up front for our attentions. I join the masses of people in remembering Kirby as a player that made me love the game. RIP Kirby. -mg
These are rich questions that I will ponder. They are the subtext of my life ever since my father-in-law died last April at age 61. My own parents are in their 70s and that still seems young to me. I don’t feel up to attempting an answer. It just seems as though the “right age” to die is, for me, pushed back as I get older. I am so far from being “finished” — I feel I hardly have started to make an impact in this world or to really live inside my skin.
Well Winston, I agree with you….I definitely want to leave this world quickly and quietly…like your friend, Marge. There is a certain grace in that exit. I most assuredly DON’T want to linger in any kind of long painful illness…for MY sake and for the sake of my loved ones. I’m in the middle of experiencing what BOTH situations entail. My husband died last November. It was a pretty quick thing…from diagnosis to death…BOOM! And while that is painful in one way….it certainly is much less debilitating to everyone watching a loved one fade further ane further away through various medical conditions….like my mother is doing right now. Painfully hard in every way, really. I think Marge left this earth in the best way possible…albeit, way too soon. -Joy
I’m scared of death. When I thnk about the future without some my family and friends, it makes me feel so empty. And when I think about leaving family and friends, I can barely breathe.
What a thoughtful post, Winston. Thanks for adding me to your blogroll. I’ve added nobody asked to mine.
I don’t have any fear of dying but it’s the lingering illnesses, the losing your mental capabilities, those are the fears. It does seem too early for your friend but at least she got to raise her children and that’s a gift in itself.
Some years ago now, a young woman in our community went horseback riding with her much older cowboy husband, they came back to the house, made love, and then took a shower. She got a headache and suddenly everything was gone. Aneurism. She was 30 with children yet to raise and like your friend, no clue something was wrong but suddenly it was over. There are no answers for such. I’d like to think there is meaning in everything that happens but don’t know if there is or not…
Anyway my sympathies to you and yours as such a loss is never easy to contemplate. It does reinforce my own belief– live each day as though it’s your last, never leave undone what you have a choice about, and tell those you love frequently how you feel.
Dylan Thomas wrote about Raging against the dying of the light, but it’s Roger McGough that’s my favourite :-
http://www.savory.de/mcgough.htm
Stu
PS: Nicely written blog, thankyou for sharing these moments with us.
I lost a son when he was 23 and a husband when he was 61. It is difficult. It tears holes in your soul. There is no such thing as closure. Time makes it easier, but it is never really easy. Somewhere, sometime, you begin to smile again and then one day even dance. Thank you for your honest thoughts on life and death.
If we had our choice, we would all simply not wake up one morning. It is certainly preferable to lingering after we cannot care for ourselves, are dependent on family and/or strangers to do the most undignified things for us.
My son was completely paralyzed in a wreck at age 22, and chose to have the life support machines turned off. He was no Christopher Reeve, had no wife or children to live for, but refused to become a burden to the family he had. Our Parents lived into their 90’s without good cognition but good genes and lots of medicines from the doctors to keep them functioning. I have an aunt who lived wonderfully until she was 100, and is now 105, but life is burdensome for her and her caretakers.
So the answer to when is a good time to die: When there is little we can do for anyone else. The difficulty comes in making that decision ourselves, planning for it, and making it happen in a society that really doesn’t allow us to die when our bodies and minds are used up. So we just hope that we will be as lucky as Marge and not wake up one day. Her family will miss her terribly. But I already miss the aunt who has not yet died.
Death is one of the things we all have in common. It seems trite to say that, but the feelings that we share around the deaths of loved ones, and around each others’ losses do as much to bond us together as the joyful occasions like weddings and birthdays.
The subject of death dredges up such a broad spectrum of feelings, emotions, ideas, opinions, and traditions. Thanks to all who read this, with special thanks to those who left a piece of themselves by their comments.
So many questions. So few answers. It is indeed strange that a phenomenon as ubiquitous as death, “one of the things we all have in common” as Frank Paynter points out, is one that we know so little about. It remains a veiled, mysterious window into whatever is beyond — a window through which we cannot see, a one-way passage with no return.
Death and the “beyondness” of death also define and divide us into warring tribes, each certain that their brand of religion, or lack thereof, is the one and only true way to the perceived rewards that await us through the window of death.