I do have, from time to time, and overwhelming feeling of dread. This usually happens just before I get to sleep or if I wake up in the night. I do and don’t know why.
But it always comes back to V and what has happened and whether anything was really real or not and, therefore, whether anything can be real in the future – with or without V.
V is due to move out in the next few days. This is good and bad in that, finally, there will be some sort of closure, which I certainly need. It’s bad in that, from that point, we shall drift apart, as yachts on a still lake, without means of steering, or, maybe, race away from each other as if down different ravines; the threads that once held us together becoming more stretched and thinner until, finally, they snap or melt to nothing.
And my thoughts turn to ‘home’ and what it is and what it really means. And to why we are here and why we even have to struggle through life – to what end? Does it all really serve any purpose?
For if there is no ‘life after death’, other than the memories of others and if, like me, one remains childless without anyone to need to remember me, then there really is no point.
And, therefore, people believe in ‘life after death’ because it fulfils their need for a point.
But, tell, me, if we have that wrong, then why?
In the hours leading up to my grandfather passing away, his body began to deteriorate, his breath was heavy and his chest rattled with each inhale of air.
Though I was certain that inside that gaunt, near death body his mind was alive and active. Indeed, just a few hours before whilst he still had some awareness of what was happening around him he had tried to get up and out of the hospital bed to go home.. he hated hospitals. He could still respond to us talking but was no longer able to communicate.
So his body was giving out but his mind was still working – his spirit still living.
Eventually, his body arrived at the state of clinically dead – where his lungs no longer had the strength to pump oxygen and his brain, cut off, would no longer be able to process information – but it caused me to wonder where does life really begin and end? Our body is a machine that eventually breaks down – but we are able to sense, feel emotion, have the will to be something or somewhere.
Maybe it’s easier for me to believe as a Christian, but it was at that moment I felt I could visualise an immortal soul struggling in a dying body – a spirit ready to leave the machinery and be free.
What is life? What is the state of death? Even our greatest scientific minds are divided over the definition and the purpose. It’s clear that even if we can stitch together all the body parts, that we can’t ‘breathe’ life into the lifeless – once a life is gone from a body, it does not return, otherwise strangle victims would revive – where does it go?
Hi-
Your post and the reply above are both very intense and raise, or raise again SO many questions that come down to one’s faith and beliefs about such things.
As I have followed, intimately, the death of your relationship with V, I have been deeply effected – and in this final chapter I feel your loss – see your reach to him until there is no more stretch.
I believe that what was always is – the love you created and nurtured for yhears is part of you forever and therefore it lives on as part of you and him. Nothing can change that – not ever. I actually feel a defiance about that as if to say “it’s mine and no one can take it from me”!!!
Very deep questions Andy –
Love to you
Gail
peace and hope for us all.
Hi Andy–
I left, what I felt was a thoughtful and sincere comment – it was awaiting moderation and now it is gone. Did I offend you?
Please let me know.
Gail
peace…..
@LF. Yes, I understand what you mean and, I guess, as a Christian, you have the faith to believe. I just wondered, what if we have got it wrong?
@Gail. Thanks for the comments. Yes, of course, the love remains and will always remain. But now? If it’s not watered and cared for, is it like a plant and it will shrivel and die? And, if so, then what?
You are probably experiencing a feeling of void due to the end of your relationship with V. You have to adapt to your new life. It will be hard but it will pass. They say life always wins – until our last encounter with the Unwanted Guest, when we are defeated at the end.
What is the meaning of all this? I don’t know. I am no believer neither and I have no solutions. I have just retired and I feel some void as well in this moment of my life. I wish my mind were less flat to help a little bit more. We met only via the Web, but I feel close to you.
Hi Andy
I know that loves I have felt before are still loves. I believe it takes a conscious effort to “kill” love and left to it’s own it will live on in memory and as part of who we are for having loved that person. I don’t think love ever dies unless we choose to kill it for whatever reason.
I could be wrong.
Love to you
Gail
peace……
You’re right, MoR. It is a feeling of void which happens in those moments where I’m not doing anything and the thoughts, always just below the surface, well up and flood my brain. I also know it will pass or, at least, lessen with time or, at least, I hope so.
There was no answer to this, really, since it is a matter of faith rather than knowledge.
It is a strange thing, the Web, isn’t it? All you have are the words written which give an indication of who a person is but, from only those words, we get to like or feel close to people through it.
Thank you.
Gail. I hope you are not wrong. I will keep my fingers crossed that you are right