How Are You Doing?

I get asked many questions during the day. “What’s up?”, “Can I get you anything else?”, “What would you like?”, “Large or extra-large?”, “Can you please stop bothering me?”, “Why do you have to be so weird?”, “What’s with all the stalking you do?”….

You know.. normal things.

However, in my life, there is one question that beats them all. One question that if I am never asked again in my entire life, I will be so perfectly fine that I might do a dance. Granted, I would have to be dead in order for me to know whether it happened or not, and a dancing dead body might freak out the locals.. but I’d be cool with that.

Digression at it’s finest folks…

Anyway, that question is, “How are you doing?”. Now, this sounds like a normal question, I know. But let me put this into the context for you. At a funeral, or after someone passes, everyone pours out of the woodwork and is overly concerned with your well-being. Genuine, I know, so I don’t hold it against them. But every one of them walks up with sympathy in their face and espouses to you that same question.

“How are you doing?”

I’m civil. Or at least I lie to myself and tell myself that myself is civil. Myself. (it just needed one more myself). So, I smile and act polite and recite the words, “I’m fine” or some other combination of words that means about the same thing.

I know I sound jaded. Let’s not beat around the bush. I am. Most likely. Never been diagnosed by a doctor, so I’m not particularly sure if you can self diagnose that particular prognosis. But, after the amount of family members and close friends who had died on my over the last 10 years, I have gotten a bit tired of that question. (by the way, I stopped counting after 15)

“How are you doing?”

It’s like this cannon-shot going off next to my ear that I just want to look at the person right in the face and go…”Gee, I don’t know. My (insert close family member here) just died, someone who I’m never going to be able to see again and only have the memories of them to hold onto. It only happened a few days ago and I have been trying to take care of taking care of their last wishes, so I haven’t had time to process my loss yet, but, hey, I just want to thank you for checking on me and reminding me that I just lost someone dear to me and haven’t really worked out how that all makes me feel as of yet. So you want to know how I’m doing… I’m FINE!”

Granted that is exactly how I answer that question.. minus everything before the last two words. And without the capitalization.

Like I said.. Jaded. I get that.

These days, when I am placed in the position of the person offering condolences, I have a completely different view-point of what that looks like. I no longer ask “How are you doing?”, I just walk up, stand quietly and just let them know I am there. Sometimes I offer something encouraging like a hug, a “hey, or a “love you bro” kind of thing (bro-dette if it’s a she). I talk a bit about the person who passed, if I knew them, remembering some good times. If I didn’t, I will ask a question or two to get the person to share with me a little about their memories. I usually conclude with something like.. “sucks man” before I walk away.

However, there is one thing I will never say to someone in this situation. And for the love of God can we please take this phrase out of our vocabulary… “Call me if you need anything.”

Cause, yeah, in the middle of all of this.. that’s exactly what I was thinking.. who can I call if I need help. Oh, the 8 billion people who have told me to call them. Seriously!?!?

Instead… how about we change that to…”Hey, I’ll call you in the next few days.” or “Hey, I’m bringing dinner over tomorrow.” or.. something like that.

Ok.. I seriously could rant about that for another 1500 words… but.. so not the point right now.

So after reading all that…

How are you doing?

(and if you don’t get the sarcasm in that… /facepalm)

In response to The Daily Post’s writing prompt: “Plead the Fifth.”

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How Are You Doing?

I get asked many questions during the day. “What’s up?”, “Can I get you anything else?”, “What would you like?”, “Large or extra-large?”, “Can you please stop bothering me?”, “Why do you have to be so weird?”, “What’s with all the stalking you do?”….

You know.. normal things.

However, in my life, there is one question that beats them all. One question that if I am never asked again in my entire life, I will be so perfectly fine that I might do a dance. Granted, I would have to be dead in order for me to know whether it happened or not, and a dancing dead body might freak out the locals.. but I’d be cool with that.

Digression at it’s finest folks…

Anyway, that question is, “How are you doing?”. Now, this sounds like a normal question, I know. But let me put this into the context for you. At a funeral, or after someone passes, everyone pours out of the woodwork and is overly concerned with your well-being. Genuine, I know, so I don’t hold it against them. But every one of them walks up with sympathy in their face and espouses to you that same question.

“How are you doing?”

I’m civil. Or at least I lie to myself and tell myself that myself is civil. Myself. (it just needed one more myself). So, I smile and act polite and recite the words, “I’m fine” or some other combination of words that means about the same thing.

I know I sound jaded. Let’s not beat around the bush. I am. Most likely. Never been diagnosed by a doctor, so I’m not particularly sure if you can self diagnose that particular prognosis. But, after the amount of family members and close friends who had died on my over the last 10 years, I have gotten a bit tired of that question. (by the way, I stopped counting after 15)

“How are you doing?”

It’s like this cannon-shot going off next to my ear that I just want to look at the person right in the face and go…”Gee, I don’t know. My (insert close family member here) just died, someone who I’m never going to be able to see again and only have the memories of them to hold onto. It only happened a few days ago and I have been trying to take care of taking care of their last wishes, so I haven’t had time to process my loss yet, but, hey, I just want to thank you for checking on me and reminding me that I just lost someone dear to me and haven’t really worked out how that all makes me feel as of yet. So you want to know how I’m doing… I’m FINE!”

Granted that is exactly how I answer that question.. minus everything before the last two words. And without the capitalization.

Like I said.. Jaded. I get that.

These days, when I am placed in the position of the person offering condolences, I have a completely different view-point of what that looks like. I no longer ask “How are you doing?”, I just walk up, stand quietly and just let them know I am there. Sometimes I offer something encouraging like a hug, a “hey, or a “love you bro” kind of thing (bro-dette if it’s a she). I talk a bit about the person who passed, if I knew them, remembering some good times. If I didn’t, I will ask a question or two to get the person to share with me a little about their memories. I usually conclude with something like.. “sucks man” before I walk away.

However, there is one thing I will never say to someone in this situation. And for the love of God can we please take this phrase out of our vocabulary… “Call me if you need anything.”

Cause, yeah, in the middle of all of this.. that’s exactly what I was thinking.. who can I call if I need help. Oh, the 8 billion people who have told me to call them. Seriously!?!?

Instead… how about we change that to…”Hey, I’ll call you in the next few days.” or “Hey, I’m bringing dinner over tomorrow.” or.. something like that.

Ok.. I seriously could rant about that for another 1500 words… but.. so not the point right now.

So after reading all that…

How are you doing?

(and if you don’t get the sarcasm in that… /facepalm)

In response to The Daily Post’s writing prompt: “Plead the Fifth.”

The Last Breath

It was just after 11am as I recall. I had been at work when I got the call. Walking back onto the grounds of the same hospice I had been at only 6 years earlier when I watched my brother pass away was a task of Herculean effort as every memory from that month flooded back into my brain like a lightning bolt crashing into the ground. This time, however, it was for my father-in-law. Not easier, just different.

I walked past the screen patio where I spent many nights with my family during the last days of my brother’s life and the only reprieve I had in storm of emotions that was ripping through me was that I did not have to go into that building. I passed by, glimpsing over one last time as I walked into the building opposite, crossed the family room and walked into the room where my father-in-law was.

I saw my wife, seated next to her dad, holding his hand. His eyes were closed, his body wracked and shambled from the cancer that had ravaged him for the last year and a half. Her sister stood on the opposite side, watching. The room was dark, the mood was somber, and the setting bleak. We all knew this was going to be it, the last place we would ever see him.

In the subdued setting, the only noise that could be heard was his breathing. Raspy, jagged, wet and inconsistent. He would take a breath, almost gurgling it in, then ten to fifteen seconds would pass before he would take another. That noise deafened the room when it happened.

I stood across from my wife, he ability to comfort in such an extreme situation something to be marveled. Here she was, saying goodbye to her dad, and yet somehow she maintained a smile on her face with words of serenity flowing forth. Her eyes told a different story, tear-stained and wet.

Another breath.

Afraid to break the silence that blanketed the room, I mouthed to her if she was ok. She nodded, but we had ridden this rodeo before and both knew that the proper answer to give was never what was truly going on. I looked down at my father-in-law, using every bit of strength I could muster to keep a strong face on, needing to be that for her.

Another breath.

This one was stronger. Deeper. Different. I think my wife held her dad’s hand a bit tighter. Somehow, I think she knew. No one said anything for a long time. Thirty seconds passed. A minute. Finally, someone suggested we get the nurse.

When she came in, we all knew. Her words just echoed a truth we had come to accept already. My wife and her sister said their final goodbyes and as we all left the room I finally let out the breath I had been holding for a long time.

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Here Lies Death

I have heard the following quote used by many people over the course of my life:

“A coward dies a thousand times before his death, but the valiant taste of death but once. It seems to me most strange that men should fear, seeing that death, a necessary end, will come when it will come.” ― William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar

Might I just say, I totally disagree with it. Emphatically.

Sure, Ye Ole Billy boy was implying the statement to a soldier in battle, but even then, this is romanticized at best. To say that a brave soul only tastes death once, obviously invoking the physical death meaning, and yet the coward dies a thousand times? Obviously we are not speaking of physical death here, which makes the argument one of apples and oranges, therefore invalidating the statement as a whole.

Sorry Will.

I believe we all think about our mortality on a normal basis. When we aren’t paying attention and almost rear-end the car in front of us, that awkward pain you feel that sends you into a panic, or that one particular moment where every second of your life flashes in front of your eyes. For some of us, we can move beyond that. For people like me, we get stuck there for a much longer time.

It’s all the same though. For a moment, for a minute, for longer, we think about death. We think about the would have, could have, should haves. We evaluate where we are. Then we carry on.

Eventually.

No, I think Will had it backwards. I think the brave taste death a thousand times. The coward, they face death and it beats them. Then they run from it at every chance they get. Or end it.

It takes a brave person to live. It takes a brave person to go on. It takes a brave person to account for who they are, recognize, and then do something about it… in spite of death.

Physical death comes for us all. Once.

There is enough out there trying to stop us from living. Death just does it in a more permanent manner. So my advice to you (and even more so, to myself) is to shout out:

Live Till Your Dead!

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