Death

Some years ago a good friend of mine passed away. It was a shock to me.

Being in my mid-thirties, I am getting used to hear that either mine or my friend’s parents, aunts, or grandparents pass away. Knowing that they died at an advanced age for some reason makes me feel less worried, or affected.  Death is the last step of the human life in planet earth. It may or may not be something else in the afterlife. I want to believe there is something else but I do not know for sure. So when I hear that an elder person passed away, I think: “ It is normal, this person was born seventy, eighty, or ninety years ago. Probably got a college degree, had business, got married, raised his/her child, babysat grand kids, it was the right time”.  Other times the news come with the relief that the person was suffering a terminal condition for a long time, cancer, dementia, Alzheimer, you name it, which also “makes sense” for the announced death.  When there are accidents that end the life of a young person, I can only think that this person was at the wrong place at the wrong time… and then immediately the attention goes to the ones the deceased left behind; wife, husband, daughters, sons, parents, unfinished work, unfinished degrees, a project cancelled before its finished. Why?  Destiny? Fate? Coincidence? Karma?  It is uncontrollable but there is not blame to anyone (except when the accident involves a drunk driver).

In my friend’s case she was not old, she had no terminal condition, or she was not in an accident. She was in love. She was in love with the wrong person. I still miss her.

by Karen G. Rodriguez Montiel