Where There's A Will

There's nothing like a session with a lawyer to update my will to get me thinking about life, death, and the meanings thereof. It wasn't so much the will itself that set me to pondering things; that part's pretty straightforward, and it just deals with stuff.

It's the whole end of life health directive part that made me think. What do I consider quality of life? Under which circumstances do I want to invoke the happy pills and pain pills only clause? And, since I'm thinking about being in that state, planning for the possibility even, that means I need to consider that I just might get there one day. Given the givens of this COVID year, it's almost a relief to sit down and think these things through; I think they've been taking up some subconscious mind-space for a while now.

Somehow, putting it all down in black and white makes it more real. I've not been in total denial about things - the ins and outs of my life for the last decade don't lend themselves to thinking it can't happen to me - but I haven't exactly thought them through, either.

Turns out I'm not the hang on to every minute of life sort of person after all. I don't want my body to stick around if my mind is gone. I don't want to live all of the days after all, if living means just delaying the inevitable for a few days or weeks, and those days will be spent in pain. Nope. Bring on the happy pills and pain pills, and let everything else go.

As I thought, I tried to picture the faces of those I love as they will be when they hear I've gone on to whatever-it-is that comes next. Their tears tore my heart, but the images also brought me a measure of peace.

I've been to my share of funerals, but the one that most haunts me was that of a woman I didn't know. This was back in the days when I was cantor at church, and they called me in to sing for her service. She was young-ish, in her early sixties, and there were just seven people present at the mass. Seven. Such a small world she must have lived in, that so few would come to wish her farewell.

I WANT people to miss me when I'm gone, because that will mean I touched their hearts while I lived. It will mean I managed to bring a little light to a world that can seem overwhelmingly dark some days. It will mean I managed to be on the side of Good, at least some of the times. (It turns out that being an agent for Good, at least some of the times, is important to me.) It will mean I found a way to give back in return for the gifts I was given.

Now, with any luck, that day will be many days in the future. (I can hope.) Still, it feels good to know I've thought some of this through; that I can leave a guide for people to follow. They won't have to waste energy wondering what I would have wanted if tough decisions need to be made, because they won't have to guess.

That's something.