On Death

Sudden deaths are the worst. Or so I think. I've never walked through one personally before so I wouldn't know and I wouldn't dare stick my feet in and say I do and undermine the true experience of those who have. But recently, a lot of people have been dropping dead. Suddenly. Especially while they're running. So I've been forced to think of the consequences of a sudden death. I say consequences and not implications because death really does give you no choice but to deal with it and its consequences.

I think sudden deaths are the worst. Like for the spouse/girlfriend/lover, what do you make of it? One minute you're talking to the person, the minute, there's nothing left of the person to even grasp hold of. And as a wife/girlfriend/lover, I suppose you just don't know how to let go of the love right? Because you didn't stop loving. The person you love just ceases to exist. So the rope is just cut like that. Snip, gone.

I think that's the worst position to be in, one of romantic love with a person who has expired. Because the place that person had in your heart can actually be filled by another. Romantic love is possible of replacement. It's different from sibling love or child-parent love or any of those other relational dynamics. You can't replace a brother or a sister or a father. There can be close substitutes and surrogates but you can't and you aren't supposed to replace it. In romantic love, you can replace the person with another and the love with a new one. Of course some people would proffer that this is impossible in their personal situation (that they can't and will never replace the love of their lives or whatever) but generally, most people can find it within themselves to do it. In fact, it'd probably be a good idea to move on, especially if you are a girlfriend or boyfriend to the deceased.

So that's the worst position to be in because you don't know if you're doing the person an injustice by moving on. Your love didn't die, the object of that love did. So what do you do about that? Do you continue loving a non-entity forever? Do you keep being in love with the memory of your past love? Do you move on and count it all joy? You can leave the love and move on but you're technically not leaving anything because the other person left first. But that leave was forced upon both of you. He didn't leave voluntarily, death took him. So it's your fault by default that you moved on and left the -relationship- since you're the one who actually took active, conscious steps in that direction. You're the only person there is to blame. Yet you cannot be blamed because who can blame decisions like that! How do you deal with such complex issues? !

Perhaps when really dealing with a death, your heart speaks more than your mind does so you probably won't be processing all these iffy questions. But that's why I'm doing it now for myself. In case it happens to me too. Then I can read this and answer my own questions. But God forbid.