Dying to Live

"The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven out of hell, a hell of heaven..." - John Milton, Paradise Lost

I have no idea if there is a heaven. I have no idea if there is a hell.

I find it  hard to imagine golden streets and a heavenly host of angels; frankly heaven can sound kind of boring.

I also find it difficult to believe there is a fiery pit and a ruler with a  spiked tail constantly punishing us.

I think we punish ourselves more than any devil could do.

I think we can find more joy than any gold street could carry.  Hold a newborn, laugh with your best friend until you can barely breathe, take a lover who knows you, watch a sunset and don't capture it with a camera, just watch it.  Feel the wind on your face, toes in the sand, a hug.  All of those things and so many more bring a heavenly feeling.

Hell is a panic attack in a public place, the loss of someone you love, the physical limitations of our bodies as we age, the mental torture we put ourselves through.

There is a special hell for people who have stay behind and watch our loved ones go. Sometimes death will be quick, other times it will drag out and we will watch the suffering not being able to do anything about it.

I have encountered a new hell.  Watching someone disappear, slowly, a little more each day.

One day she will not know me.  For now she does, but she has lost all our times together.  My best friend, the woman I aspired to be more than anyone, I am now terrified of turning into.  My Mother.

Her brain is being erased in a cruel and unknowing way.  She smiles and nods and tends to laugh to make us think she knows what is going on.  But she doesn't.

She no longer recalls our secrets, our inside jokes, the trips we took together, the times I would sit and watch her clean out her purse letting me keep all the change that fell out.  She has lost the way we related to each other.

Where is she going?  I want to know.  I want to be able to visit her there and see her again.  I want to introduce her to my love, who never met the real mom I had.

Her hair is white, her skin is porcelain as it has always been.  A stark contrast to my own.  She is already looking like she is fading away.

Is she in hell or is this hell just for all of us that have loved her?

I feel like a petulant child who wants her mommy back.  It is true.  I want her back and she is not even finished with her journey of going away.

One day she will look at me and smile because she feels that is the right response, but the truth will be that I will know the smile is fake and she does not know me anymore.

One of the most colorful women I have ever known is fading into shades of pale.

I search for the good in all this, I dig, I ponder.  I have no answers. I see no meaning.  Only cruelty.

I sat and watched the sunset tonight with my love.  We watched the sky change colors, we felt the breezes, and held hands.

Wherever my mom goes, I know that she can still look at a sunset and appreciate it.  She will forget it, but for one instant, just one, she will be there in that moment.

I will sit with her and hold her hand for as long as she will let me.

This life we each live is so often wasted.  I know I am guilty of not living, of not feeling alive, of living in the past or living with the dead.

I want to live in the moments with my mother, the small moments she has left.

Will this happen to me? Will I become what I always wanted? Just like my mother?

If so, I hope that my children come and sit and hold my hand and try to find me.

"You know I am dying to live until I am ready to die." - Johnny Lang