Left to right: Christopher, Nico and someone special
August 11, 2014
Death sucks. That's a fact, and meeting our maker is a gimmie regardless of how many miles I run on my treadmill. Looking back at pictures of our deceased family and friends is painful in many ways. Not because they are dead but because they lived.
I feel angry and defeated when I look at pictures of my twin daughters or wife. Their death was untimely and seemed unfair. I see my wife Mimie's smiling face in all those other pictures, which feels unreal. Like many pictures of deceased friends and family members, all of us gain a smile when we reminisce about the happy times. But our reality is that eventually, those thoughts and happy faces fade, and the pain of the fact is all too real. They are gone, and we yearn to hear their voice again.
But they lived. They were here with us, and so the pain lasts, knowing that we won't see them again.
If grandma dies at 92, it's understood that that is how life naturally occurs. I miss my grandmother and have so many fond memories of her, but she lived a great life in the end. Although, I remember talking to her before he broke her hip and ended up in the hospital. She loved to dance, and while dancing, she said, "I'm not old, I'm young, I'm not ready to die yet."
Knowing her is one of the great gifts I received in life. And the pain I still feel faintly in my soul resonates, and I miss her dearly because she lived.
The disease takes its fair share of loved ones. My uncle died of cancer. What a motherfucker that disease is. It robs your soul of your true self, and when it sucks out all your marrow, the tumors take your life away. My uncle was a gifted man with automobiles. He lived hard and played hard only to be sidelined by a disease that he once proclaimed to me, "After my surgery, I saw God out my hospital window. He was standing with my father. I stared at him and said, 'I'm not ready yet,' and they left.
He lived a couple of years longer but eventually succumbed to his withered body as so many did. There isn't a broken-down car that I see, and I don't think about it in my mind. "My uncle could fix that." His loss, like so many other losses, hurt because he lived.
Growing up, we all looked up to the older boy next door. He was good-looking, popular, athletic, and generally a good person. He and I were friends. He never made me feel less important than any other person. I really liked him, as did so many others.
The good person that he was, he tried to break up a fight and was stabbed multiple times. He didn't know it was occurring while the knife plunged into his stomach. "I'm drenched in sweat," he said. We discovered it was blood. He died in that street. Damn, he was a good guy. His death hurts because he lived.
So many family members and good friends have left me during my time on Earth. And each little bit of pain defines itself to me in its own way. I can't change death, but I can still live regardless of how I feel.
Their life, like so many other people who I have lost, known, or had the privilege of growing up with on TV or in the movies, tears at me because they lived. I was a part of their life, and their impact is felt even now at this very moment. Losing a loved one is supposed to hurt because they lived. And I'm grateful they lived because I can still feel the effects of losing them pain me deep inside. That only demonstrates their profound impact on me and allows me to remember them. It's a feeling that keeps them alive forever in my mind.
I can run on my treadmill all I want. I won't outrun death. We live to die, and it's an existence we can't hide from. And those who go before us will impact us more in their death than in their lifetime because it's harder to accept that they are gone. And that just sucks. But it's because they lived that makes it more difficult to accept that they are gone. Memories mostly make us laugh, and that laughter simply masks the pain. I don't know much other than death sucks, and that's a fact.
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