I Don't Want to Die

(I initially wrote this post two weeks ago but did not publish it. After re-reading it today I decided to post it nonetheless.)

There. I said it. It is the same phrase with which the majority of us would respond if asked. It is my response to the unavoidable ultimatum I have reluctantly received. Oddly, I am less afraid of death itself, which still seems as surreal a concept as it ever has or ever will. No doubt that will change once the doctors tell me "the end is nigh".

I never thought I would be making decisions about what sort of ceremony I would like to mark my passing, nor that I would be putting pen to paper to enscribe letters to be read at my own funeral. That said, it is not death nor its immediate aftermath that brings me sadness but the thought of my wife and son carrying on without me. The thought that my wife will not have me around to talk to and provide a shoulder to cry on through what will ultimately be one of the toughest times of her life. I want to be here to comfort her after my death. I know it makes no sense but how could I not want this?

My son. My gorgeous, inquisitive, loving, and smiley son. The thought of him having to accept the loss of his father is almost too much for me to bear. The thought that I will not be there to read to him any more, to read him "The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy", "The Colour of Magic" and "The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe" when he is old enough. I won't be there when he starts primary school, when he graduates from high school, when he gets caught drinking in his friend's house as a teenager and I have to come and pick him up in the middle of the night, to see him fall in love, to comfort him when he has his heart broken, to give him strength when he needs it most, to be a grandfather to his children. I think of me now at 39 and still having my father around and how much I have relied on him over the last 39 years and my heart breaks.

These are the things I think about when I have my weaker moments and they bring me great sadness. Though, I am trying where I can to fill in some of these gaps. I have begun recording myself reading him "The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy". I am trying to catalogue all of my recorded music, I have purchased a video camera and am trying to think every day of how to fill it with memory creating moments for my wife and son.