Death

[PatrickG]

It's been a long, strange year.

I lost my grandfather. One of my friends from high school died in Iraq. I just got the news that my high school theatre teacher, a great mentor and, in a way, a friend, died of cancer.

Up until a couple of years ago, I wasn't terribly close to the people that died. Each year, each day, each week, it seems to come closer to me, breathing on the back of my neck. I watch people disappear one by one, now conscious that my time will come whether it be hours, days, months or years.

Maybe if I was a bit further ahead in my life, maybe if I had children or expected to have children anytime soon, it wouldn't feel like this but...

One by one, it seems, the roman candles are snuffed out. The stars fade to black leaving only the void of an empty night.

There are still memories and hopes and dreams. Things that were or never were or will be or might be.

But my heart goes out to everyone who's lost someone this year. I'm an overemotional, sentimental fool for even bothering to say this perhaps but... I really feel now that those of us who carry on have an obligation to eachother as survivors, as orphans of a past that we can never return to.

My one great wish right now is that everyone finds time for friends and family and even strangers to make smiles and memories. I'll try to do my part.

Happy holidays. I hope everyone finds some way or time or place to shine. The cold comes too quickly; the sleep comes too soon. I'd just urge everyone to live with the heat and light of a star, to live with such brilliant vivacity that we leave those who survive us blinking at the afterimage of our glow.

Love. Hope. Live.

[Cam63]

I'm sorry for your losses this year, Patrick.

[matterconsumer]

Coming to terms with death isn't easy.

But it's something that we'll all deal with more and more over time.

Chin up!

[Phoney Bone]

I know how you feel. I went through the same thing a few years ago when five of my family and friends died in a six-month period. It does get better. Focus on the good times you had with them. My best to you.

[Jeff Brady]

Patrick, I went through a period where I was going to so many funerals, I started wearing black all the time to save on wardrobe expenses. If you ever need to talk, PM me.

[PatrickG]

Thanks, guys.

Thing is, it's just put everything in perspective a lot for me as the new year approaches.

Love and friendship are what really matter. And good teeth.

Off to the surgeon for wisdom teeth in a week too!

I feel a bit like Arthur Dent in the movie Hitchiker's Guide when he has the epiphany about love just as the mice train the drill on him. (I laughed for a good five minutes at that... and was the only one who found it funny. Karma is a harsh mistress.)

[Cam63]

Good luck with the fangs, too.

[The Xenos]

Oh yeah. I remember a couple years when there were a number of close deaths. Mianly older aunts, but in a close Greek fmaily those rather can hurt. This year hasn't been bad. A few years ago I lost my grandmother and my other grandfather lost his brother. Of course my granmother also had Alzheimer's, so that was even worse and at the same time made the death almost a relief.

I later ended up meeting a girl, falling in love, realising that both of us were too mentally unstalbe for it and things broke up. Nevermind that both of us were at least borderline suicial. More of that whole death thing. Then I started slowying wearing mroe and mroe black. My roomate kept joking that he hoped I wasn't going goth. Though I gotta admit always being a Batman fan and being a Sandman and Death fan for years and already likeing black, I was halfway there already.

Anyway, dunno where i was going with that. Right now I really don't think I can handle a relationsip, so I keep thinking I shall jsut help by parents as they grow old and then just live the rest of life alone.

I cetianly don't see myself killing msyelf, realize how wrong that is. I hope she has. I've rather accepted death and realize how natural it is. It still hurts, especially if it's sudden. I guess that's moreso regeret of things unsaid and undone than the death itself. Hey, they're not suffering or anything anymore, they're better off. it is us, the survors who have feelings to deal with.

Oh wait. Ealiter this year, I jsut rememebered it was this year, one of my mom's cousins suddenly died. he left behind a daughter whose marrage was breaking up and a grandson in sore need of a gandfather. He was a great guy. Now that is really sad. It sucks, but I rather don't blame God or whatever youw ant to call it. I think this world is corrupted, not that the world itself is corrupt, but it has been corrputed. We should be able to help each other with these things, with grief, with our fears and problems, but we don't. Humanity is messed up. The problem is not in the stars, but in our hearts, Cassius. We don't deal the cards, we just deal with what we're delt and we should be able as a society to deal better. Meh. I dunno where I'm going with this either. I guess i'ms till trying to figure this stuff out too.

-Xenos

[the4thpip]

This will be the first Christmas without my dad. :(

[PatrickG]

Thanks for sharing, guys.

[Azrael52]

Pat, sorry to hear you're down. We're your CBR family, here, and if you need to vent, or whatever. I'm here, too.

[jnscott]

This year I have lost 2 Uncles, 3 Aunts and 1 Cousin. I don't have any more Uncles left so its going to be a holiday filled with memories, but good ones and thats what you have to try and remember.

I'll miss my Uncle Nick but every time I see a flashlight I will remember him. Why? Every year he gave me a flashlight for Christmas. It might be a flashlight/tire gauge (he was mechanically inclined) or a flashlight/radio but it was always something that had a flashlight attached to it. Good memories.

[The Xenos]

Man, I just had one hell of a disturbing dream. I'm bakc home and jsut waking up or something. I look in the fridge and go to get cranberry juice. FOr some reason I also grab a big jug water. I also see in there a sweater. My dad comments it's likley my late grandmother's. I sit down at the table and accidently pour the cranberry juice into the water, then pour that into a glass so it'a not all mixed.

Then I notice her. Sitting at the table is my now not so dead grandmother. My mom comes into the kitchen and explains how my grandmother jsut came back. PLus she's no longer suffering from Alzheirmer's. My grandmother starts talking and confirms this. This is the first I've heard her speak since hearing her whisper "I love you." to be the last time I saw her a couple of days before she died.

Yeah, freaky as hell. Then I went ot the computer in the other room. Had trouble to get to Google, which was weird itself. Something to dow ith a winamp playlist in the web browser. Anyway, I go to google news and the first story I see is that a boy somewhere was also back from the dead and started shooting people because he was actually a robot. It was then that I kinda freaked out and called my mom over to read it.

Then my real alarm went off and woke me up. It was my first alarm to stir me, so I turned it off. I quickly grabbed a drink of water and immediately went back to bed.

Gosh dammit that ws feaky.

-Xenos

[The Xenos]

Oh and one thing that was also messed up in that dream that I forgot. After my mom told me about the whole dead coming back. I suddenly thought that this girl I loved who I hadn't seen in years had killed herself, then she'd be back and be alight too.

Then again, i've had like half a dozen to a dozen or more dreams where I've seen her die or found out that she's killed herself. One dream I even saw a site where they had authopsy photos of all the wounds she made. Yeah. I woke up and was quite disturbed for the whole day after that one.

On the other hand I also had a somewhat pleasent dream about her and Death. Though this was the Neil Gaiman character from Sandman who we both liked. One time I remember Death vistited me in my room. She looked an awful lot like that girl, though her skin was of course paler instead of the beautiful color she had. We started fooling around. Now despite how nice and somewhat naughty that dream was, it also had the overtones of the idea of death. When I woke up from that one, despite the niceness of it, I also worried something had happened to her.

-Xenos