A life

What if you had only a few days to live?

Suddenly everything comes into view and you are stabbed with the fear of leaving everything you’ve grown up with, people you’ve come to love along the way, an existence you were so fond off but now you cant think of anything else but silently listen to the rain. Surprisingly you find solace in the soothing beat and long to walk out of the house and stand in the rain and let the water wash away this disease that is hungrily taking your life.

In this stage you choose to be happy. Desperately trying to believe that this state of mind will perhaps by a stroke of luck rid you off the pain and things will go back to normal, normal meaning the mundane life; the old grumpy office chair, the complaining parents, the silly friends, the life you got carried away by, that you took it for granted.

You try to close your eyes for awhile, hoping that the diagnosis by the doctor was just a bad dream and feel that once you open your eyes you will wake up to feeling foolish, of suddenly being so philosophical and serious and flippantly joke about it with friends.

Yes, this is a time when you desperately cling to all sorts of thoughts and scenarios, when you feel the need to remember every moment in your life, before you stop remembering. You remember your mom’s lovely garden of tulips, you see yourself being chased around the fish pond by your brother and clumsily falling down and scraping your knee. You remember the ghost stories your grandfather used to tell with such fervor and you can still feel the cold chill run down your spine. You remember the picnics with your family and clearly see your father casting his fishing rod in the river, where after a while you see a frantic trout caught on the hook …you are reminded of death and forget this memory instantly. You remember being the subject of complaint amongst teachers and see that annoyed look on your mom’s face after school…it’s a miracle how you turned to be an ace in college. You remember not belonging on either side of your parent’s family, and when growing up you always wondered why you spoke fluent English while your friends could speak fluent Dzongkha. You remember your first crush and blush at the sight of him catching you with a weak knee. You remember your crazy friends from school and the hilarious punishments you all got from the Biology teacher for bunking classes. You remember the first party you went to and the feeling of embarrassment, when your parents came to pick you up, when the party hadn’t even started. Memories are now rapturously flooding, and the streaming hot tears blurs remembering and slowly brings me to awareness, brings me to “now”.

In death you find the reason to live, and until that fateful day comes you make sure you live the remaining days in happiness.