Random Thoughts on Mortality

We're all going to die. It's inevitable. It's a fact of life. We came to this earth to accomplish some things, with any luck we'll have a nice long life with lots of friends and family around us, and we will accomplish what we set out to do. And when it's all said and done, we leave our earthly life and go back. It's called "death," and it happens to us all.

Now I'm starting to get up there in years. I remember as a teenager thinking that I'd be 60 in 2007, and how far away that was. Well, it WAS far away--like 40+ years ago. But life has a way of continuing on, whether you're paying attention or not. Bingo! Here I am, I've lived more years than what I have left to live. Time to think about this a little more seriously.

And, there's nothing like having someone close to you, come close to death, to make you even more aware that time is passing.

On New Year's day, we got a call from our daughter Heather, who had an email from her cousin Marci, that her mother (my sister-in-law), was in the hospital with some sort of heart problems. They were going to run tests and see if she had had a heart attack, and run an angiogram to see how her arteries were doing. For the next several hours we sat waiting for more news. In the meantime, we did manage to get ahold of Marci, or she got ahold of us. We exchanged several phone calls and waited some more. Finally, later that evening, Marci called us back with the news. Three blocked arteries, and they would be doing bypass surgery probably on Weds.

Now my sister-in-law, Sandy, is a young 68--turning 69 in June. She has had some health problems, but has been taking better care of herself. We saw her on Christmas Eve as she & her husband came to our family celebration. She seemed fine to us, but we later found out that Marci, who had seen her the day before, didn't think she was so fine and wanted her to go to the doctor. She toughed it out another week, and finally had to admit something was wrong. Her son Brent drove her to the hospital, after she refused an ambulance.

To cut to the chase, Sandy is doing much better. She should make a full recovery, and of necessity should make some lifestyle changes to ensure she'll be around for a few more years.

Her wake-up call was ours as well. If we don't make some changes of our own, we may find ourselves where she was--or worse.