Content warning: This article contains mentions of death and dying.
As someone with a very anxious soul, I worry about most anything. Lately, though, with the world feeling like it’s spinning out of control, I’ve been worried about death. Where I normally have a very clear and clean acceptance of death, the worry over the state of the world has brought it back tenfold.
I’ve never been someone consumed with the thought of death. It never haunted me at night or impaled my thoughts at dark times. I made my peace with it and accepted that it was coming, whether I wanted to or not. But with things getting scarier in world news and struggling to find comfort in anything, I feel like I’m finally experiencing the panic that a lot of people have when they think of death.
My mind spins the thought of dying around and around, like a hamster on a wheel. I think about everything that I still have to accomplish, and the permanence of death has the ability to take that all away. Now, I realize that this consistent loop is not healthy, nor productive, but I can’t stop. Honestly, one of the only things that’s been helping is looking at other people’s perspectives of death and dying.
I’ve read poem after poem, read people’s experiences with dying and being resuscitated, and searched for anything to hold onto and give me comfort. I haven’t found much.
However, as a big fan of Rhett and Link, and Mythical in general, I frequent the Last Meals series on the Mythical Kitchen channel. There’s a section where the host, Josh Scherer, asks the guest how often they think of their own death. In an episode with comedian Caleb Hearon, he says something that really stuck.
Around the four minute timestamp, Caleb says that he thinks of death as driving home at the end of a long day with friends and family, feeling satisfied with the company, and now feeling glad to be on the way home alone. Being happy to see everyone and then going off to do your own thing, maybe seeing your people again soon, or maybe not.
Death is such an alarming thing to think about. It’s almost impossible to fully grasp the concept, but listening to him describe it in such a nonchalant way was so reassuring. Still unknowing of the specifics, but understanding that you’re going your own way, away from your people, still feeling loved.
Everyone has felt that feeling of driving home after a long day spent around those you love. The mix of contentment and tiredness wraps around you, and the potential of other plans hangs in the air. This is such a perfect analogy for death. There are big unknowns, like the possibility of seeing your people again, but they’re softened by all the time you’ve spent loving and being loved.
There’s a separate quote I think about, originally posted to Twitter but now long gone. Someone tweeted, “I hope death is being carried to your bedroom when you were a child & fell asleep on the couch during a family party. I hope you can hear the laughter from the next room.” Though the original tweet is lost, I think about this in tandem with Caleb’s analogy.
For now, it’s enough for me to focus on the fact that I will leave, but not without that feeling of love and contentment. Death is still sharp, unforgiving, and it still finds its way into my thoughts, especially as new headlines roll in every day, but it’s less overwhelming when I think about it in a softer way. It’s something I’ll eventually return to, carrying everything and everyone I’ve loved with me.