Death and Dying

[Penelope]

While I understand the feeling of loss I also have immense respect for the mindset of a friend who died of pancreatic cancer a couple of years ago.

When he was diagnosed and the outcome was clear he started bringing the local newspaper to the coffee shop each morning. He'd take out a little spiral notebook and pencil then open the paper to the obituaries. He never noted names; only the ages of those who died (he was approaching 80 himself and had about 4-months to live). Then he'd add up the ages and divide by the number of deceased. That, liberals, produces what is called "an average". When the number was less than his own years he'd slap the notebook shut and proclaim: "Done it again!".

Asked by innocents what he meant, he 'splained that he had, once again, beaten the reaper's batting average.

We miss him.

But we don't mourn.

Yes 80 is a good long life, and many die much younger, but its still sad.

 

[Penelope]

Not to diminish the emotional trauma what we experience when someone close to us passes away but isn't that self pity in reality?
I felt sorrow and pain when my close relatives passed away and when my close friends passed away so I am in the same emotional state as most of us are when it happens.

Yes , but its a emptiness I feel, people who shared the same memories as me, but your right, we shouldn't let it put a damper in the life we have left.

 

[HenryBHough]

A little more about that friend who died with pancreatic cancer.....

He had accumulated quite a fortune in gold and silver coins; kept them in a big old safe in his living room.

Toward the end a grandson and his family came to stay with him. One grand daughter, about 8, was a favorite. Summer afternoon when it was too hot outdoors he'd open the safe and let her use the coins as sort or building blocks. Making walls and towers and all kinds of fun kid stuff.

Each evening he'd put it all back in the safe and spin the dial.

He never wrote down the combination.

He refused to write a will.

He told something to the little girl and made it their secret.

When he died and his brother who, under intestacy laws, stood to inherit tried to open the safe....he couldn't. Somebody remembered the little girl knew something about the safe!

They grilled the girl and finally she spilled the beans.

"Grandpa didn't tell me any numbers. He only said to tell people that he wanted that base tard to work for every penny."

"What's a 'base tard'"?

It took a locksmith hours to get into the safe. Many expensive hours.

The little girl isn't little anymore but she still remembers her grandpa fondly and still feels bad that he's gone. The brother, on the other hand, seems ...... well..... not so much.

 

[ChrisL]

Cancer is such a terrible disease. Sorry about your friend, Dhara.