I started writing this book about twenty years ago. I was in my fifties at the time and was obviously beginning to become aware of ageing and my own mortality. I thought it would be an interesting literary exercise to record my decay and approach to death. As a writer I believed it would be an interesting exercise to record my thoughts and feelings regarding death and describe the symptoms and impact as the inevitable approached.
I envisaged that in the ensuing years I would wake up one day with a pain, a lump, a cough or such-like and receive a diagnosis. Then I could the symptoms and emotions. Interesting. So I called the book ‘The Death Diaries’.
Well, twenty years have passed and I have aged. The process has been slow and frustrating as I lose strength, libido and energy, as my body develops aches and limitations, as my memory fades and my sharpness recedes, but, so far, no incident I can identify, no diagnosis, no terminal illness or date I can hang on my death. I live and function and greatly enjoy life.
This book has been something I have returned to periodically as the muse struck me. I used it as a vehicle to investigate death and my thoughts regarding it. I’d written around fifty pages when I lost it. A computer hard drive failure. The book was dead. I resurrected a number of bits and started again. This is Death mark two! Death warmed up as my Mum used to say about how she was feeling.
Today I passed a hundred pages and thought I’d share a little. Below is today’s rough effort!
The Death Diaries
So what do I expect to happen after I’m dead? Will I discorporate and find myself up at the ceiling looking down at my dead body? Will I drift around as a wispy spirit, a ghost, to wander the earth forever? Will my guardian angel be there to guide me? Will I be attracted to a tunnel of light? At the other end of that tunnel will I be ecstatically reunited with lovers, friends and relatives (no enemies or nasty people)? Will I be dragged down screaming by demons to burn forever and be tormented in pits of burning sulphur? Will I be carried on the back of a giant condor to a fabulous land where I will spend forever? Will I spend eternity singing in a celestial choir and worshipping god? Will I wake up in a glorious paradise where the weather is always warm, but not too hot, cooled by fountains and waited on by twenty four handmaidens whose only task is to bring me pleasure? Or perhaps I will find myself in a great hall on a wooden bench at a long wooden table groaning under the weight of meat and tankards of ale being waited on by buxom wenches? Will I have to pay Charon to cross the Styx? Or bribe St Peter to put my name in the book so I can pass through some pearly gates? Will I find myself in a happy hunting ground? Or will I become a star travelling through the Milky Way? Will there be a camp among the stars where I will meet up with friends and family? Will I come back as a blue bottle fly or slug? Or will my good Karma lead me to life as a happy person, a man (or woman) of contentment, creativity, fulfilment and wisdom? Will I join with some universal mind and find my identity dissolve into oneness with everything? Or, as my mother believed, would I go off to the mansion of restoration and healing where I will be healed of all physical, mental and emotional ailments, restored to new and sent out for another dose of life to learn new lessons so I can progress to higher and higher levels and achieve perfection?
Well, as you might imagine, I reckon it’s none of the above (even though a few are quite appealing). It always amazes me that people are perfectly capable of simultaneously holding a number of these options and outcomes. It also amazes me that every culture has different after-death variations that seem remarkably to suit the needs of their circumstances. The American Native Indians imagine a land abundant with wildlife to hunt while the Norsemen imagine a great feast with plenty of meat, ale and sex, the desert Arabs imagine a Paradise with cooling fountains and plenty of sex, while the poor Christians have to content themselves with harps, cherubs and chaste singing forever. The other thing is that the women always seem to get a rough deal. They are only ever there to wait on the men and give them limitless sexual pleasure. You can’t imagine that the kitchens providing the food for those eternal feasts are manned by men can you? It’s the poor women doing the cooking and washing up!
You don’t think that these visions of eternity are the product of very macho, male-centric patriarchies, by any chance?
Every culture has its own version and every culture insists that its version is the only one that is correct. There are as many after-death myths as there are cultures. Most of these stories have already passed into eternity and are as dead as dodos. The ones that are new enough to be written down still exist. We find most of them utterly ridiculous, fanciful and quaint (while clinging to our own stories) and recite them to our children as fables and myths while keeping a suitable whimsical smile on our lips. Those people can’t be blamed. They are so innocent. They didn’t know.
It’s a shame really. I quite fancy a flight on a giant condor and sailing through the Milky Way has a certain charm (though I can’t help wondering if the Cherokee who envisioned following that trail to the camp among the stars really had any concept of the distances involved).
No. For me (with a sad sigh) I have to put all these fabulous eternities aside. As I die I imagine the biochemistry in my brain cells will grind to a halt, the cells will die, the neural complex that connected me to my sensory input will decay, the electrical network (I use the term lightly) that forms the construct of me as a person, my personality, thoughts and memories, will fade away, and I will cease to exist.
The universe will simply have to go on without me.
I am sure that the loss of my consciousness will impact greatly on the billions of galaxies and countless zillions of stars and planets that make up this infinite universe. My loss will be mourned west of Beetlejuice. My influence will ripple through infinity forever! The impact of my life will resound!
No it won’t. I’ll just be gone forever.
The universe will go on and on and I won’t know. My body will decay. Tissues will break down. Atoms and molecules will flow into the air and fluids seep into the ground. I will be consumed by decomposing worms, maggots, bacteria, fungi and various invertebrates. My bits will dry and blown in the wind. My skeleton may even fossilise. All my atoms, like all the atoms that have ever been in my body, will be released to play with other atoms, forever. They are perpetual motion machines that will only fall apart when the universe cools to absolute zero – -273.15 Celsius. That will take quite a while. Meanwhile, after a mere few billion years, the sun will expand into a red dwarf and incorporate the earth and most of the other planets and I will shine just like my Mum always said I would.
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