Funny things happen when mortality hits me in the face. The last time, about 12 years ago, I was so sick with meningitis I didn’t even think about it until I was better. This time I have “something” wrong and the docs are trying to figure it out.
Am I gong to die? Probably not today. But yup, will sometime.
As will you.
So many people are AFRAID of dying. Other than I want to stick around to watch my kids mature and I have a few more things to do, I’m not afraid. Whatever your belief system, if you have faith in a religion, you have been told what the pathway is at the end of this life. So why be afraid? 
The funny part is that some people think that just because they have a faith inspired belief in what happens upon death they don’t understand that that is not the common concept. One very well intentioned 14-year-old once told me he was particularly worried about me because I am Jewish and have not accepted Christ as my Savior. Because of that, he warned me, I would be going straight to Hell. When I told him that Hell is a Christian construct and I was a bit concerned about any religion like his that had to use a stick like that to try to get their members to comply, he was confused.
So what do you expect? Is it scary? Why?
Me? I’m just going to try to keep on keeping on until my time arrives. My belief system is that good deeds done here and now is the way to live. What good is a promise of heaven if you never helped others lives here to be better? And so….onward.to the next adventure.
April 12, 2015 at 11:57 am
i appreciate all of this Beth. Thanks for digging deep once again!
❤
April 12, 2015 at 5:23 pm
My oldest sister was feeling her pending mortality with her 65th birthday so we’ve been talking about that for a couple of months now. This unknown illness (at least it is not contagious!) is weird….if not for regular “check up” blood tests I never would know! I’m just ornery enough to keep on keeping on even when I’m sick LOL
April 9, 2015 at 10:22 pm
Hoping the docs figure it out. I think not knowing can be the most maddening.
April 12, 2015 at 5:21 pm
Dealing with the side effects of one of the meds has been a hassle but the pharmacist assured me it would ease after a week or so. With so many people trying to work this out I expect we’ll have it figured out soon. Blood work expected tomorrow so we’ll either know it is…or isn’t..the doc’s first guess. LOL….Every day is important
April 9, 2015 at 7:47 pm
We only have control over our actions while we are alive, and our rewards should come from being as compassionately human as possible. If it turns out there is an afterlife, then that is icing on the cake.
April 9, 2015 at 7:58 pm
Good point Keith. I’ve been attending church for the past 8 years I have been married to Graham and sort of feel like a spy. I’ve learned just enough to recognize fundamentalism when I hear it thrown at me, and it is ugly, no matter the religion. There can be so much joy in life.
April 9, 2015 at 9:06 pm
Beth- I grew up in the southern Michigan atmosphere of keep-your-nose-to-the-grindstone Baptist and Methodist churches. The best thing I took from that was the universal concept of Charity. We found housing for European refugees, hosted foreign students during closed dorms during college holidays, and our church youth group went to the poverty-stricken neighborhoods of Weirton, WV, across the river from the smoke-belching steel factories of Pittsburgh. In ’61+ ’62 we hosted and took into our public schools those African-American students from certain Virginia counties who closed their schools rather than integrate. I sat in movie club class with them so we had lots of time to talk. Having essentially left organized religion when I went to Ghana to teach in 66-’69, I eventually came to see that all I needed to do to interrupt oppression of any kind was to see the person before me as a fully respectable human being, who do to his or her past hurts was acting out in irrational ways. In my 38 years of teaching, I tried to like the child inside, but let him/her I didn’t like their behavior, and try to help them out of it. This was the only belief system I needed. I can see this element in almost all organized religions or belief systems in history, but not most of the nut-job modern-day pseudo-religions.
April 9, 2015 at 9:11 pm
When I started going to the Episcopal church with my husband I noted the similarities. Now we are going to a joint Lutheran/Methodist church which is deeply involved in community issues. We refused to kick the homeless off the church property right before Christmas and won a reprieve until March 31. Making the city face the issue that they need to come up with a solution, not just sweep it under the rug.