FACING REALITY

Another famous dead person from show business, Lauren Bacall. At least she died of a massive stroke at the age of 89. That's a good long life!

Soon all those of my generation are going to be among the fondly remembered and in a few decades, they'll slowly slip from people's minds just like the silent film era stars did. It's the inevitable fate we all face.

I guess that's why the fiction of continuing existence in heaven, reincarnation on earth and numerous other fanciful notions are so compelling. We don't like the thought of just disappearing from reality in a blast of finality. We're too unique, too special. We just can't fathom not being anymore, not seeing, not hearing, not doing loving things for people dear to us, etc.

I've had to struggle against the reality that cold reason and plain old facts forces upon us. That's another reason I don't seek after funerals and memorials anymore. I know what people expect, and I just can't conscientiously deliver it. I'm not a liar. I don't believe in furthering fantasy and false hopes. For a while I could skirt the edges because I wasn't totally convinced myself. That has all changed now. I'm absolutely convinced that this temporal existence is the real "it." I'll be just as gone as those moths being fried in my bug light.

It would be comforting to still believe in a resurrection or wafting off to heaven and some waiting 'pearly gates.' Waiting for Santa every Christmas used to be comforting too to my naive little mind. Then, I got smart and pretended to be asleep and knew all about my parents pulling stuff out of the attic and putting those things under the tree and pouring all those goodies into the stockings.

It happens to stars. It happens to everything else in the universe. Birth, existence in more or less a blaze of glory for a definite period of time and then it's all over. Even the earth on which we depend won't last forever.

I had my birth. Much of my life was a blaze of glory now that I look back on it. Now, it's beginning to fade at an increasingly rapid rate. One day, it will be over, just like Lauren's and Robin's lives and just like all those others I've known, interacted with and who are now gone.

Do I like it? Can't say I do. I just have to face it and make the most of it.