death 101

it struck me as funny the other day how no one in this country explains death. no one i know, that is. when i was 5, i lost my dog to it -- death, the culprit, always sneaky and unannounced. no one cared to explain the intricacies of how it happened and why. death takes things from us, this is the fact of life, my mother once said. that was all the education i had about the matter. but once when i was 10 years old, i watched a movie where the American parent sat next to the American child and patiently explained where the child's dog has gone, but not necessarily why. because death is an inevitable part of our lives, i propose to have an introductory course that would discuss it. why not? there's a course about sex, a course about botany; almost all the courses taught here are affirmations that life does exist and continues to exist. i want a semester that could teach me what to do if one of my aunts, in the middle of a party, mistakenly chokes on an artichoke and keels over on the spot. i want a full three months worth of discussions about sudden-deaths, mid-deaths, temporary flights. it would be good to have someone sit 256 students down and explain to all of us why some things need to be lost forever, if it's true that nothing here would continue to go on indefinitely. if by chance no one is capable enough to teach us about it, then i'll settle for someone who'd be able to announce it before it waltzes in, the way maids inform their employers about guests in victorian novels. the maid hands you a card and says, "madame, death is here and he's calling for you, this time." okay, so it doesn't really matter who does what, i was just thinking that it might be good for us if there's someone who'd be able to explain death at length for us to be able to appreciate what we have. so many people are throwing precious minutes away, stuck in jobs they don't want to be in, stuck in a marriage that's empty, stuck in a world they're not doing anything for. don't you see, there should be someone who would be able to give us back those lost minutes we drowned in as children, seeing death for the first time. a favorite saying: time heals all wounds. it does but it never leaves out the questions or picks up pieces of your wondering then hands them back to you and says, here you go. i'll help you get it all back in no time at all. i wish we had a compass all pointing us home but wishes are unreliable, like bubbles that can't stop forming then bursting into this air. so i guess i have to make do with you. travel with me. tell me what it's like for you, what you also need to know.