The Conversation

"I don't think I have ever been afraid of dying." This was said with a sip of beer and lacking the flamboyancy of youth. The friends gathered here all considered themselves older and wiser and each remembered saying something outlandish over a beer. But this was a deeper thought, edged by years running over life like river water over stones. "Never looked forward to it either mind you, but I was baptized when I was nine and just had that confidence that comes with it, ya know?"

The Christians sitting at the table smiled. The agnostics nodded. The atheist sipped his wine. Beer Drinker continued, "I have been afraid of the things associated with dying. The pain. I am one of those imaginative types who wonders if a gunshot to the brain is really painless."

Atheist replied, " Seems to be pretty instantaneous to me. One minute a singular, special intellect and the next a carcass."

"Well, yeah," replied Beer Drinker, "but you are talking about putting a bullet in the center of the organ that controls perception. What if the instant the bullet enters the brain it alters your perception of time? What if the second or fraction of a second it takes you to die is perceived as an hour? Or days? Or years?"

One of the wine drinkers replaced a lock of blonde hair behind her ear that she knew had never really moved in the first place and smiled at Beer Drinker. "You think of the craziest crap." She looked at Beer Drinker's Wife and said, "You live with this full time? How are you so well adjusted?"

BDW laughed loudly and paused with a slice of pizza raised, "I don't know about the adjustments but I stay for his food," and took a bite.

One of the other Christians who was always quiet at these gatherings spoke. "I never really wanted to die but I have to admit there have been times when I have not wanted to live. If that makes any sense."

Blond Hair was the first to respond with, "No. It does not. Absolutely does not." She said it with a smile and blue eyes and that made it softer than if any of the rest of them had said it. It also made a request out of her simple demand," Explain."

"My Dad had a wife and kids and just loved life. Tried to get as much as he could out of life. He and Mom had all these plans for after retirement to travel and see the world. I did not want to die, but if somebody had to, I was single and had no clue what I wanted to do with my life after high school. I honestly believed I would not be missed. And I knew my dad would be missed."

"I watched my dad die. It took years. When I say that, people always guess cancer. And then I wonder - when I say heart disease, do they think it was some how easier? Then I wonder why I am competitive about how people die. But it is a terrible, terrible way to go. The bullet MIGHT last for years," he looks at Beer Drinker, " but heart disease DOES take years."

Everyone took advantage of this moment to take a bite of food or to once again sample their drinks. The unspoken group decision to stall for time paid off as Quiet One continued, "Fluid just builds up in the system for some reason. We had to start measuring how much went in and how much went out. The meds they use work for a while and then they don't. They have to be upped so that they will work again until they don't. And you have to have tests to make sure they are not destroying the kidneys. Heart patients with bad kidneys won't ever get new ones and the docs are left to do the arithmetic so heart disease kills you instead of the failing kidneys. Family can sue for failing kidneys."

Atheist smiles. Quiet One could always see to the center of things the way few others in the group could.

Quiet One continued, " After he died, I had a conversation with our preacher about the cycle we had fallen into. Dad would get worse and we would go to the hospital and his condition would stabilize and we would go home thinking it could not get any worse and then we would repeat the whole process in a few months. I told him that I thought that this time would be like all the others and then Dad died."

They all sat quietly this time. Quiet One picked up his wine and then sat it back down. "The preacher was surprised that I expected to take him home. Apparently word was out that he wasn't coming home this time. Tons of folks came by to pay their last respects and I never put two and two together from that either. After years and years it was still - BAM!."

Blond Hair spoke up softly, "Ya know, there was an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer where Buffy's mom died. It was not anything supernatural. Some kind of brain tumor or something. At one point Buffy is talking with another character who is telling her how her own mother died from a long illness. Buffy said something about it not being sudden and the other girl said, 'it's always sudden.'"

Quiet One smiles. He looks over at Blond Hair and she smiles back. "Whoever wrote that, had someone close to them die. I don't think you get that if you haven't."

BDW nodded. "It does change you. The whole thing with the world measuring time Before Christ and after makes sense."

"Really?"asks Atheist in what was not really a question or even a challenge - just another exchange among friends that long ago learned to let each other be wrong.

"I measure alot of my life by things that happened before my grandmother died and things that happened after. For the longest time, I would see movies or read a book or see something on the news and my first thought would be to call her - for years after she died."

They went around the table then and shared the things that they really wanted to share with a departed loved one. Some of the examples were just after the person passed and some were recent things. Some trivial and mundane and heartbreaking in simplicity. Others were the births of children or the introduction of a spouse. Sharing of life is one of the sweetest aspects of life.

Blond Hair sipped her wine again and looked at her sister who met her eyes and knew what she wanted to say. She also knew that Blond Hair would never broach the subject on her own - of the two of them, Blond Hair had never been the Assertive One. Assertive picked up a bread stick and waved it in the air like she was summoning her thoughts with a wand. "There are times I am so pissed off at my dad. Love him. Miss him. Know I should forgive him. But almost always pissed at him."

They all knew what their dad had done. Quiet One surprised himself when he placed a hand on the back of Blond Hair and just let it rest there. She did not look at him but somehow he just knew it was okay - more than okay - for him to have some sort of contact with her. Assertive continued, "It was just so damn selfish. The ultimate selfish act. Never thought about us or Mom or his dad."

Blond Hair, "You and I have never processed it the same way. I spent years wondering what I could have done differently. I spent years wondering what I did to cause it. What did I do wrong?"

The two sisters looked at each other for just a second and then went back to their food. "That is why I am afraid to die now," volunteered Beer Drinker.

"A few years back our little dog got hit by a car. My wife had that dog for years before we met and this was just the sweetest little thing in the world. I found her out on the road and had to go back and tell her. And I saw so much pain on her face."

The husband and wife looked at each other now and Beer Drinker continued,"I cannot imagine what it would do to her if I died. I can't stand that thought. I am dreading the inevitable day when she loses someone else. But to inflict that on your family intentionally. Wow."

BDW, "Ladies let me apologize for the most sensitive man in the world to whom I just happen to be married."

"Sorry." echoed Beer Drinker. The girls waved it off with smiles and upraised glasses.

Atheist, "I get what you mean though. So much pain. And a permanent solution to a temporary problem. You two have gone through it and know it better than all of us but we have lost someone and at least know that pain - I think we can at least imagine what you are going through. You know what gets me though? When you guys talk about the good times with your dad."

"What? Why?"replied the Assertive One with her face screwed up with genuine confusion.

"I would just think that the final act would color everything."

"It does to an extent. But it was not our whole life together. There were sad, happy, hilarious, touching moments from a life time with the man," replied Assertive, who smiled as this was one of the few times she was not pissed at her father. She was smart enough to realize that this might have been Atheist's intention from the start and that played a part in her smile as well.

Quiet, "All fine and good, but with my dad, there came a time that I was praying that God would take him home. Just end the pain. Give the man some peace."

Atheist, "Why not pray that he would get better?" Again, this was not a challenge but an honest question from one friend to another who each looked at the universe from wildly different angles.

"Because my faith doesn't run that deep," was the answer that was given without embarrassment or irony.

Atheist shocked everyone, "I prayed to take my dad's place. He was dying of stomach cancer and there was nothing anyone could do. This was back before hospice was so prevalent and what the hell did we know? We were from the backwoods and broke beyond belief. I remember nights hearing him crying in pain and asking God to give me the pain for a night - just one night -so he could get some sleep."

"How old were you?"asked Beer Drinker.

"Five or six, maybe. Just wanted the man to have some relief and like you said, "and he nodded at Quiet, "I wanted it to be over. And looking back, I think he wanted it to be over too."

"I know my Dad was ready when the time came," said Quiet and he and Atheist nodded like veterans.

Beer Drinker went to the fridge and got another beer and an icy mug from the freezer. "Aren't we a cheery damn bunch?"

His wife picked up the thought just as he knew she would, " That's just it, though. We are a cheery group. We have kids and careers and causes and husbands and wives and good wine and tasty beer and great food and we live."

As good a toast as any and they all raised their glasses and drank deeply.