It's Ash Wednesday and after receiving the Ashes upon my forehead I looked down at the bracelet that contains a small portion of my Mom's ashes and the locket that contains her picture and the picture of her mother. After church I drive back to my town and pass other churches who's parking lots are also full for Ash Wednesday. When I get back to town I go for my usual walk around the cemetery. The ashes on my forehead remind me that God made us from dust to dust we shall return. We often avoid it but the truth is from the time that we are born we will die. That fact was emphasized today during my walk around the cemetery. There was a funeral taking place by a grave site. Seeing this, I think about people that I have lost and people who I know will croak at some point. I think about people I love who knew their time was growing near and have opted for Hospice care. I think about my mom's brother who is also my godfather. He is living with end stage Parkinson's disease and is now on hospice. I remember my mom a few days before she passed from end stage triple negative breast cancer with metastasis. She literally called hospice and told the hospice nurse that she heard her own death rattle and she knew her time was near. Ironically the Lord picked the same day that he had brought her fourth into the physical world to bring her back into the non-physical world. To put it simply she died on her birthday.
As father McDonald said in his sermon today we don't like to think about our own mortality. Death can be a touchy subject for people. I have a friend who's in his 90s and anytime he talks about his impending demise his daughter-in-law gets very upset with him. She tells him he's not allowed to die because she wants them to go together. However, as he points out to her, she's in her 50s and they’re not likely to go at the same time. I remember when my dad's brother was originally diagnosed with liver cancer not long after I moved here. The medical team asked him, did he want to be resuscitated or did he have a DNR (Do Not Resuscitate order). He said he wanted to be resuscitated. He held out hope that the surgical chemo would work. On the other hand I treat death with a great deal of disrespect . There are times when I tell him I'll see him tomorrow and he'll say “Well I'll probably be here but I might have just gone down the road.” This is one of the expressions he uses for dying. I tell him “Well, if I don't see you then I'll check with the funeral director in town.” I tell my nieces when I die, torch me and scatter me in the San Francisco Bay. They find my reference to being cremated disturbing but they’re used to our family’s dark and twisted sense of humor. I find treating death with disrespect takes away some of the fear of it. The late Dr Wayne Dyer said that we are not physical beings living a temporary spiritual existence We Are Spiritual Beings living a temporary physical existence. Or as father McDonald said when he put the ashes on my forehead remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return.
No comments:
Post a Comment