Death and the Race to Live

While on vacation this past week, death came up twice. The first time while I was playing a game with the fam. My husband bought me a wonderful game called "Would You Rather..." and the card poses 2 scenarios: ie: "Would you rather have an arm in the place of one of your legs or a leg in the place of one of your arms?" A harmless question, but fun all the same. Well, my daughter likes to make up her own and she asked me if I would rather be afraid of death or drowning (the special needs thing kicks in a lot). This lead me to ask her what she was most afraid of and she responded "Death." And I responded by telling her that everyone dies, so why is she afraid of it and her response was not being with her family. Yes, it broke my heart and was all too sweet. That got me to thinking about life. We do our best to prevent death even though it's inevitable. While watching the new Harry Potter Movie (SPOILER ALERT!!!) the concept of death came up again. Sirius (sp??) said to Dumbledoor (sp??) something along the limes of keeping Harry alive just so he could be killed. Again, the idea of preserving life just to die appeared. I've always said that if I get to the point I can't remember anything, take me out...which is an odd statement when I think about it. And the age old question comes up...is there life after death and if so, what does it look like? I was raised Episcopalian and still go to church, but I do wonder about this. I'm not saying the Bible is wrong, I'm just exercising my free will in my thoughts. I do pray and believe in God...I am in no way doubting my faith, I'm just curious, though. And if death is so great and many riches are waiting for us, then why live just to die? I'm not suicidal at all...remember I love my life. These are just the thoughts in my head. I do not want to ignore them or hide them, hence "Jen Uncut." Anyway, this train of thinking lead to the age old idea that we all have a purpose and no one persons' purpose is greater than anyone else's, which lead me to wondering why we choose what we do. I am also an adjunct college professor and I spend a great deal of time discussing Nature vs. Nurture in one of my classes. We are part of column A and column B and then there's this thing called personality which just makes us completely unique. It's THAT part of ourselves that I want to understand. Where does that come from? It's just all so fascinating. To weed out what makes us do what we do or like what we like is just simply mind-bottleing (thanks Chas Michael Michaels for that phrase-haha). Anyway, this is also why I love people watching. I am just fascinated by people's choices and actions, which leads to many more thoughts, but that is all I have time for tonight. Until next time...