Baby we were born to die

The other day my brother put something on Facebook about how he feels middle aged already because he never does anything fun on weekends anymore.

I left a comment saying, "Uh, news flash, you're PAST middle aged."

Later I asked him if he thought I was a dick for putting that.

Him: No, but you're wrong. I'm not middle aged yet because I'm going to live to be 85 or older.

Me: I don't want to live that long. I need to die before I turn 65.

Him: You don't want to meet your grandkids?

Me: Dude, I'll probably have grandkids in the next five years or so.

Him: Oh yeah. Well what about your great-grandkids? Don't you want to get to know them?

Me: Nah. Fuck those assholes.

Once I was afraid of love, but when it's your brother those things change

A few weeks ago I got a Sunday morning phone call. It was my dad, asking me about one of my high school friends and if I knew whether something had happened to him. My dad had seen something on Facebook that suggested that something had. Sadly, my friend had passed away early that morning. Nothing prepares you for that kind of news. I know I'm not exactly young anymore, but I'm still too young to be losing friends. It was a heartbreaking moment.

I wasn't able to attend his funeral. I tried and tried to figure out a way that I could make it all work, but just couldn't manage it. I'll probably always regret not going, but at least I sent his family a card with a little bit of cash to put toward funeral costs and a brief note telling them of a few fond memories I have of him, so hopefully they know he was in my thoughts.

I've mentioned him a few times on this blog: There was the time he and I killed Ramone, I told you about him coming up with what might be the best catch phrase ever (see the footnote on the linked post), and he also came up with the worst pick-up line I've ever heard. Of course there are other stories, and in honor of his memory, I'll share another here.

We were in eighth grade and took a class field trip to visit Fremont Indian State Park as part of our Utah history class (I think). We learned about how the Native American relicts were discovered with the construction of a new freeway, about what had been learned about their culture by the archaeologists who'd worked in the area, and we listened to some stories about some of their gods and legends. We also got to see many of the artifacts (baskets, arrowheads, pottery, etc.) that were on display. At the end of the day, we were to go on a hike to look at the rock art after having the difference between petroglyphs and pictographs explained to us.

Through some misunderstanding, a rather large group of us (15 or so boys) didn't realize that we were only to go on the hike if we had a teacher, chaperone, or park employee with us, so we took off on our own. (Okay, maybe it wasn't exactly a "misunderstanding" because at one point we heard one of the teachers with a group of students coming down the trail, so we hid from them, ensuring that we didn't have to go back to the bus just then.) We hiked around, looked at the petroglyphs, took off our shirts to get a tan, had a "contest" to see who had the most armpit hair (spoiler alert: it wasn't me), rolled boulders down the side of the mountain to see if we could splash them in the river below, and just generally had a good time. At one point, my friend (who was Navajo) sat down to eat the lunch that he'd packed, and ended up dropping some cheese on the rocks. He called out to the rest of us and said, "Look! Cheese-O-Glyphs!" then declared he would leave it there for future generations to see, because after all, he was the only Native American in the group.

Eventually we made our way back to the visitor's center and the parking lot, where unbeknownst to us, the rest of our classmates had been waiting on the bus for over an hour while the teachers were out looking for us. Needless to say, we were in a lot of trouble. As punishment, we weren't allowed to go on any more field trips for the rest of the year, and all of us who'd gone AWOL had to write a seven page paper describing in great detail what we'd done while everyone else was waiting for us back at the bus, then read it in front of our classmates so that they could experience all the fun that we'd had while they waited. Not all of us took the assignment seriously. I turned mine in on miniature notebook paper, which just infuriated the teacher and earned me an additional five pages that I had to write (a 12 page paper to an eighth grade student was sheer torture - Now, I'd love to write a paper that was "only" 12 pages long).

One of our other friends wrote about how we were gone so long because we followed the smell of the peace pipe down into the ant world, where we couldn't return until we were able to trick an eagle into flying us up through the hole in the sky to deliver us back to the parking lot. It was a derivative of one of the legends the park ranger had told us. Of course, that earned us a 30 minute lecture from the teacher on not mocking others' beliefs, and got another five pages tacked onto the end of his assignment as well. Seriously, don't ever teach junior high school kids. We were all so very annoying.

There are so many other stories to tell. There was the first time I met him: I was in seventh grade and he was the new kid seated next to me in English class. He told me he was Navajo, so I asked him to teach me some Navajo words. He told me to say, "clit" so I did. Then, when I asked him what it meant, he just laughed. Turns out he had a lot of fun being surrounded by naive Mormon kids. Then there was the time he ground up birth control pills and told everyone it was from a pixie stick and got them to taste it. Or the time we won in the playoffs in football, then stayed to watch the next game, and he went up and asked one of the cheerleaders from another team out on a date. (A year later, I took that same girl to our junior prom.)

He had the most infectious laugh. It was impossible to hear it and not at least crack a smile. I'm going to miss hearing that. And I'm going to miss getting voice messages that simply say, "Where the white women at?" followed by laughter and nothing else. It's hard to believe he's gone. I get tears in my eyes every time I think about it.

For some reason, every time I've thought about him passing away I think of the lyrics from the Jon Bon Jovi song Never Say Die. It might be because Young Guns was one of our favorite movies at the time we met. It might be because the lyrics themselves somehow describe our friendship. Maybe there are parts that remind me of his military service (he was a marine). Or maybe it's just one of the few songs that come to mind that sing about death. Regardless, I find it somewhat therapeutic (particularly the very last verse), so I'm going to post them here.

As we stood there older than the men

And younger than the boys

We were still as the wind

That blows on a hot August night

And you were lonesome as a jukebox

But deadly just the same

I could be as gentle as a newborn

Then spit into the eye of a hurricane

And we knew how to laugh

And we knew how to cry

Yeah we sure knew how to live

But we don't ever

Never say die

Never say die

I guess you'd say we had a pact

These words we knew so well

Still they remained unspoken

And we'd take them to the fiery gates of Hell

Once I was afraid of love

But when it's your brother those things change

'Cause love is just another words for trust

So hear me when I say

Never say die

Never say no

You've gotta look them in the eye and don't let go

When it's your own blood you bleed

And your own tears you cry

When you're brought up to believe

That it's the strong who survive

Never say die

Yeah and we could run like lightning

Through the pouring rain

And we'll be standing like a soldier

Who comes marching home again

They ask what it is that I want written

On the gravestone where I'll lie

Tell them it's just my bones that died there

So save the tears they'll cry

'Cause my spirit is still riding

Somewhere in this night

When it's these three words that come to me as I kiss this world goodbye

Never say die

Never say no

You've gotta look them in the eye and don't let go

When it's your own blood you bleed

And your own tears you'll cry

When you're brought up to believe

That it's the strong who survive

Never say die

Rest in peace, Elston Louis. You were a true friend, and you will be missed!

At every occasion I'll be ready for a funeral

One more funeral related post, then I'll quit. I swear.

There's obviously been a lot of funeral talk this past week. Here's what my kids have said they want to have happen when they die.

Tortellini: I want to be cremated and then have my ashes put into somebody's mailbox.

Togers: I want to be cremated and then have my ashes thrown at someone I hate*.

Mr M: I want you to take my body and throw it off a cliff, because that would be an easier way to bury me. And I don't want my funeral to be fun like Grandma Great's was with food and everything. I just want there to be a whole bunch of dead chickens, and everyone has to eat them raw.

So there you have it. With any luck, I won't still be around when they go and someone else will have to carry out their wishes.








*I asked Togers who he was going to find that would be willing to throw his ashes at someone, and Mr M immediately raised his hand and said, "I'll do it."

Hold on to those you hold dear

The second I saw the name on the caller ID I knew what the call was about. I answered it anyway.

"[Minnow], it's Mom. [Uncle] just called to let us know that Grandma died a few minutes ago."

Even though it's been expected for a while, it's still hard to hear those words. My mother and I talked for a few more minutes, but then I decided I needed to get off the phone so I could call my kids and let them know. My ex-wife went and rounded them up, then called me back when they were all together so I could tell them over speaker-phone. It seems like such an impersonal way to spread this kind of news, but sometimes that's how things have to be when you're hundreds of miles apart. By the time my ex-wife had them all sitting there together, and I finally told them what was going on, I honestly think my kids were relieved to find out that it was my grandma (who we all knew was going to pass away) instead of theirs.

My grandmother was a very religious woman, and didn't want anybody to be sad when she was gone. She wanted her funeral to be a celebration of sorts. She was ninety-two years old, and lived a full life. Few, if any, of us will make it that far. I just wanted to take some time to reflect on some of the memories I have of her and share them here.

I visited my grandma a few times this year. Never for more than an hour or two at a time, but it was enough. I think. During one of those visits she told me, "I have nineteen grandchildren. Each one of them thinks that they're my favorite. And you know what? They're all right!"

She had several traditions that helped make us all feel special. Every year I looked forward to getting my birthday card from her. She must have paid a lot of postage, because she'd tape coins to the inside of the card, one of each kind for every year I'd been alive. For example, when I turned ten years old, she sent a card with a ten dollar bill, ten one dollar bills, ten quarters, ten dimes, ten nickels, and ten pennies. That was quite the haul for a ten year old back then. At least it was to this ten year old.

We always looked forward to spending New Year's Eve at her house, because we were the only kids in the world who were lucky enough to have a second overnight visitor from the North Pole. It wasn't Santa Claus though. He only came on Christmas Eve. But wouldn't you know it? There were always a few left-over toys and treats that needed to be taken care of, so Santa sent one of his elves, Johnny Green, to deliver them to her grandchildren on New Year's Eve. My parents would always discourage us from discussing what Johnny Green had brought us when we went back to school. They didn't want the other kids to have to feel bad that Johnny Green never came to their Grandmas' houses.

She had a large back yard, which was perfect for Easter Egg hunts every spring. There were dozens and dozens of colored eggs set out for all the grandchildren to go out and find. Some of them were just colored eggs. But some of them came with a cash reward. It was probably just her way of keeping the tradition alive as we all got older, but there were some competitive searches for the grand prize egg, which, if I remember correctly, was worth ten dollars. Several other "cash" eggs were set out that were worth anywhere from five cents to five dollars. It was easy for a kid to go home slightly richer than they'd arrived that day.

My grandma grew up in the Bear Lake area (in southern Idaho/northern Utah). We had a few family reunions there, but one summer she took just me and one of my cousins to visit Bear Lake for a week, where she took us around to show us all the places that were important to her. We spent time swimming in Bear Lake, water skiing behind her brother-in-law's boat, exploring the depths of Minnetonka Cave, diving off of rope swings into mountain lakes, shooting pool, and perhaps most importantly eating raspberry shakes. It was only a week, but it left a lasting impression on me.

I could go on, but I won't. I already feel like I'm rambling. I just have one more. I visited her last year, and she asked me when I was going to have another paper published so that she could read it. I told her I was working on it, and she said that I needed to work faster because she wasn't getting any younger. I'm happy that I got the chance to visit her a couple of days after defending my dissertation. Not only did I get to tell her that I'd passed my defense, but also that I'd had a paper accepted for publication. She didn't get to read it (or the second one that was accepted the following week), but she didn't want to anyway. It was just her trying to make me feel like the favorite grandchild.

I'm going to miss her.

At every occasion I'll be ready for a funeral

Last week, one of my best friends lost his mother. Her funeral was on Saturday. I debated long and hard about whether I was too busy to go, then realized that it shouldn't matter how busy I am, some things have to be more important than anything else. Close friends fall into that category, so I went. I'm glad I did.

A few observations from the weekend:

- The good ones always seem to leave us too early.

- Cancer is a bitch.

- There is absolutely nothing you can say to console someone who has just lost their mother.

- Ditto for someone who has just lost the love of their life.

- My way of dealing with grief is to try and laugh it off (sometimes it works, sometimes it makes me look like a jerk).

- It's good to see old friends, even if it is at a funeral.

The ghost of my dance instructor pushed me down into an open grave

We're all going to die someday. It's good to let people know what your wishes are for your funeral, burial, etc. So, depending on what the circumstances of my death are, here are some potential things for my family to put on my headstone.

- What are you staring at?

- The badger won.

- I will haunt every last one of you.

- He died like he lived - on fire.

- The ground needed to be fed.

- It's getting hard to breathe down here.

- Attention graverobbers: No treasure buried in this coffin.

- His heart exploded from doing too much coke.

- Lived a life worthy of The Jerry Springer Show.

- I shaved my balls for this?

- I'm just sayin'. I'm dead.

The ghost of you lingers

My graduating class recently had the 15 year reunion. I didn't go because the brilliant minds who organized it held it on a Wednesday night. (Seriously, who holds something like that on a weekday?) In the weeks leading up to the reunion, one of my old friends from high school took the lead at setting up a web site for our class. I grew up in a small town, so there are only around 70 people to list, so it's not unmanageable.

The guy who set up the site is a prime example of why I hate politicians though. I'm not sure exactly what he does, but he lives in Washington D.C. and works for one of the senators or congressmen for the state of Utah. I can't remember which. I just remember being annoyed at our 10 year reunion when he asked if I was a "good biologist or a bad biologist." When I asked what he meant by that he responded, "Well, do you think the endangered species act is a good thing?" Knowing that he was conservative, I just said, "I guess that makes me a bad biologist in your eyes because I do think it's a good thing."

One of our former classmates died about a year after we graduated, or maybe it was that summer. I didn't know him all that well, I just remember hearing that he had drowned and thinking that it was sad that he was so young. Someone else from my class alerted Politics Guy to the fact that this guy had passed, so Politics Guy put this on the site he set up for the class:

His death was reported by another classmate. If you have details on his passing, please e-mail [Politics Guy] ASAP -- especially if he's still alive. But then knowing [The Deceased] (if he's alive), he might find it humorous to read about his own death. Thanks!

That last part really annoyed me. Yeah, [Politics Guy], you obviously knew [The Deceased] quite well. You know, since he's been dead nearly FIFTEEN YEARS and you didn't even know.

Nothing's prettier than a pretty girl digging a heart shaped hole in the ground

Girl: Don't do that.
Me: Ok. I'd hate for you to feel the need to kick my ass.
Girl: I wouldn't do that.
Me: Yeah, but you probably know people who could. You could probably even call them up and say, "I need your help. Get a hole ready for me out in the desert."
Girl: I wouldn't do that to you.
Me: Good. I don't want to be buried in the desert.
Girl: Ok. It'll be in the forest then.

I'm ok with that, as long is it's someplace that looks like this:


















And for a closer look:

Can you still have any famous last words when you're somebody nobody knows?

In case you needed more evidence that my thoughts take me to some pretty strange places, the other day I started thinking about what I'd like my last words to be. I mean, think about it, if someone else is with you when you die, these are the words they'll be repeating to anyone else who asks them about your final moments. Since these words will be repeated over and over again (if you're not famous, or even well liked, you could probably get rid of the second 'over'), they are not something that should be taken lightly.

There are tough guys, like Doc Holliday, who simply go out saying, "This is funny." However, I'm not particularly tough, nor am I very brave, so I can't follow along in the footsteps of Doc, or any of these other guys (those who were involved in revolutions usually have the best ones).

Nathan Hale: "I only regret that I have but one life to give for my country"
Charles Darwin: "I am not the least afraid to die."
Karl Marx: "Go on, get out! Last words are for fools who haven't said enough!"
Che Guevara*: "I know you have come to kill me. Shoot, coward. You are only going to kill a man."

The reason why it's so important for me to figure this out now is because when this type of thing is left until the last possible second, people end up saying things like Pancho Villa did:

"Don't let it end like this. Tell them I said something."

Now, I'll never be as famous as any of these people, but I'd still like to go out with something cool. After much deliberation, and depending on the situation, I'd like my last sentence to be one of the following:

"See you in Hell!"

or,

"Oh my, that feels good."

or,

"The treasure is buried in the . . ."




* My favorite by far. Too bad Che said it first.

You're all gonna die, could be 20 years, could be tonight

I was swimming laps in the pool today and my arms started getting tired. I wondered how long I'd be able to swim to try and stay alive if I were ever stranded in the middle of the ocean. Then I wondered how long I'd even want to if I knew that death was inevitable. That got me thinking about what it would be like to drown. I decided it would suck and I really don't want to go out that way.

Here's a list of other ways that I don't want to go:

• Starvation
• Cancer or any other painful, drawn out medical condition
• Grizzly attack
• Cyanide poisoning
• Being gut shot
• Snake bite
• Hypothermia
• Gangrene
• Buried alive - whether by a crazy person or a mudslide/avalanche

Here's a list of ways that would probably be acceptable to me:

• Automobile accident - a fiery explosion would be an added bonus, just as long as I died quickly and didn't have to sit there on the side of the road, burned to a crisp like Anakin Skywalker at the end of Episode III.
• Shot in the head
• Drug overdose (highly unlikely since I don't use drugs)
• Hanging - not to be confused with being strangled
• Slit throat
• Electrocution
• Falling off a cliff
• Plane crash
• Carbon monoxide poisoning
• Guillotine

I'm sure there are others that I'm not thinking of right now so it's not a complete list. If any of you are planning on killing me, please don't. But if you must, stick to the bottom list.

Anticipation and Mortality

My ex-mother-in-law died last night. It's a really sad thing, but she reached a state at the end where I believe everyone was relieved to see her go. It's not easy to see someone you love in such a condition.

She was a trooper though. She held on much longer than anyone expected. The doctors told the family that she most likely wouldn't make it until Christmas, and she held on for another two weeks past that.

I had the dubious honor (I say that because it wasn't a fun experience, but I'm still glad I had the chance to show my support) of sitting at her bedside to make sure that she didn't need more medicine, or try to get out of bed if something startled her It was basically just to keep watch in case anything happened. While sitting there I had a little time to reflect on our mortality. That's not something I do often. In fact, I remember mentioning to my father a couple of years ago that I don't seem to be aware of the fact that I am mortal. Things that ought to scare me don't. There's only one time in my life that I can honestly say that I thought there was a chance I could die (when I was a teenager I hung over the edge of a 500 foot dam with some of my friends). As a result, I've done a lot of things where I probably could have died, but just not been afraid enough to refrain from doing those activities. Luckily, I've made it this far.

I was told the other day that people don't really start to think about their own mortality until sometime in their 40's - when they realize that it's coming up. It seems like the longer one lives, the more one wants to keep death at bay (There was a time when I thought I didn't want to be alive past the age of 50, now I want to live much longer).

It just seems to go against our nature to let go. We spend our entire lives doing everything in our power to stay alive. And for good reason, the world is a beautiful place. It's just terribly sad to see someone hang on a long time after their body has already quit on them. A time like this makes me realize how much I want there to be a God, so that the end of life is just us passing on to another phase. I'm hoping that I'll have a chance to see her again, just as I hope my kids will have a chance to see me again after my time finally comes.