Death (2)

A family member died less than two weeks ago, which of course has me thinking about my own beliefs on death.  I wrote a little about it previously, and I wanted to elaborate a bit on those ideas here, or rather frame them in a different way.

Before I talk about what I believe happens when a person die, I should first talk about what a person is.  We have such an individualistic view of people, one that is sometimes hindering and isolating.  I have my thoughts, my opinions, my decisions, my life, my relationships.  However, it’s difficult to determine where I end and another person begins.  When anything happens in my life, whether it’s something happening to me or something that I supposedly instigated, it is never an isolated occurrence.  It always has a million threads connecting me with everyone and everything else.  Everything I decide, think, and do is heavily influenced by everything else around me.  Everything I am, every action or reaction — it is never just me.  It only involves me, includes me.

So why should death be viewed as an isolated, individual occurrence?  If our lives are so intertwined that we can’t see the separation between each other, why should death change things?  I believe it doesn’t.  When someone dies, they don’t disappear.  Many people refer to others’ memories, histories, etc, like the common line (paraphrased here), “If we remember so-and-so in our hearts, then they are not really dead.”  But it’s more than that.  It’s not just something as intangible as carrying someone in our memories, or seeing the influence someone has had on another person’s life.  The person — everything that made them that person — continues to be a part of everything else, just more so.  There is no physical body to separate him/her, or to provide the illusion of separation.  They continue to exist as part of everything else.  Their bodies are now earth, their spirits are now spirit matter, their memories are part of a global consciousness, their influence and impact on others is not lessened (though over time, it may be more indirect).

Death is not the end.  It is not the beginning.  It is not leaving, nor is it staying behind.  Instead, it is shedding the cocoon and opening up to the world, despite only having seen the underside of a leaf up until that point.  Fortunately, we didn’t have to even recognize the world’s vastness to become a beautiful part of it.

A stray kitten’s death

(Disclaimer: please do not read if you don’t have a strong stomach. I include it here because death is often so romanticized in pagan metaphor and stories. This is the opposite of romance. Please also note, for perspective, that I am a foreigner in China; had I been in the United States, I would have taken this kitten to a vet to have it put down immediately.)
 
Today I stepped off my porch and saw, directly in my path, a tiny stray kitten that looked dead. The worst part about it is that it wasn’t.
 
I looked closer, horrified. Flies were covering it, which is why I thought it was dead. On its legs and feet it looked like there was white paint smeared on its orange fur. As I looked closer, seeing its breath very faintly rising and falling within its unrealistically thin and boney form, I realized that it was not paint. It was maggots, clumps of tiny fly maggots. They were covering small patches along its legs and chin, and filled one of its ears.
 
If I were watching a movie, I would not have seen so much detail. I would have muted the volume, closed my eyes, and made someone else tell me later if it was important to the plot point. But there was no mute. As I approached, it started mewing, and the flies continued to ignore its attempts to survive.
 
When faced with high-stress situations, something inside me takes over and tries to be practical in whatever way I can. I gathered a few towels and a basin, put some warm water and shampoo in the basin, put on some plastic gloves, and bathed the kitten. I knew it was unsaveable, I knew that doing anything would only postpone the inevitable, but this kitten literally was in my path, and I could not just walk away.
 
I washed away most of the maggots, cleaned out its infested ear, and dried it in a few hand towels. I spoon-fed it some water. Through the plastic dish gloves and towels, I stroked its forehead and fragile body. I talked to it. “Oh baby, baby, what have you gotten yourself into.” I sang. I cried.
 
The kitten went in and out of consciousness during this process, sometimes being quite aware, opening its eyes wide and struggling to bring itself upright, but sometimes it lay so still that I was sure it had died. I kept talking and singing to it for my own benefit more than it. I kept stroking it, wanting it to be me instead who was physically consoled, however selfish that desire may seem.
 
I wanted it to give up, and it wouldn’t. It just kept breathing. It kept mewing.
 
After I bathed it, I had to really think about what to do next. There were three options available: try to save it even though it was very much past that point, find a way to kill it quickly and painlessly to end its misery, or to set it aside and let it continue the slow process of dying, as it was doing before I intervened, however unfair its death is. The first was pointless. The second, I did not have the courage to do. So I went with the third. I kept it wrapped in a towel, found a quiet place in the corner of my yard hidden under trees and bushes, and left it there to rest.
 
Tomorrow I will bury it. I do not expect it lived until sunset, and if by some curse it did, I highly doubt it will survive the night despite the mild weather.
 
It is a cat. I know this. It is a kitten that never got a fair shot, born to a stray mother, likely near some trash pile that introduced the maggots. What upsets me even more than just this one kitten (which upsets me greatly as it is), is that I know it is not just this kitten, and it is not just animals trying to fend for themselves against the brutality of nature. There are people who die similarly around the world, born to horrible circumstances and given a terribly unfair lot in life until, slowly, life gives out. There is no outrage, no grief, that can match what these circumstances deserve.
 
All I want to do is go home and be loved and watch my favorite TV shows and pretend that this is not the world I live in.

A stray kitten’s death

(Disclaimer: please do not read if you don’t have a strong stomach. I include it here because death is often so romanticized in pagan metaphor and stories. This is the opposite of romance. Please also note, for perspective, that I am a foreigner in China; had I been in the United States, I would have taken this kitten to a vet to have it put down immediately.)
 
Today I stepped off my porch and saw, directly in my path, a tiny stray kitten that looked dead. The worst part about it is that it wasn’t.
 
I looked closer, horrified. Flies were covering it, which is why I thought it was dead. On its legs and feet it looked like there was white paint smeared on its orange fur. As I looked closer, seeing its breath very faintly rising and falling within its unrealistically thin and boney form, I realized that it was not paint. It was maggots, clumps of tiny fly maggots. They were covering small patches along its legs and chin, and filled one of its ears.
 
If I were watching a movie, I would not have seen so much detail. I would have muted the volume, closed my eyes, and made someone else tell me later if it was important to the plot point. But there was no mute. As I approached, it started mewing, and the flies continued to ignore its attempts to survive.
 
When faced with high-stress situations, something inside me takes over and tries to be practical in whatever way I can. I gathered a few towels and a basin, put some warm water and shampoo in the basin, put on some plastic gloves, and bathed the kitten. I knew it was unsaveable, I knew that doing anything would only postpone the inevitable, but this kitten literally was in my path, and I could not just walk away.
 
I washed away most of the maggots, cleaned out its infested ear, and dried it in a few hand towels. I spoon-fed it some water. Through the plastic dish gloves and towels, I stroked its forehead and fragile body. I talked to it. “Oh baby, baby, what have you gotten yourself into.” I sang. I cried.
 
The kitten went in and out of consciousness during this process, sometimes being quite aware, opening its eyes wide and struggling to bring itself upright, but sometimes it lay so still that I was sure it had died. I kept talking and singing to it for my own benefit more than it. I kept stroking it, wanting it to be me instead who was physically consoled, however selfish that desire may seem.
 
I wanted it to give up, and it wouldn’t. It just kept breathing. It kept mewing.
 
After I bathed it, I had to really think about what to do next. There were three options available: try to save it even though it was very much past that point, find a way to kill it quickly and painlessly to end its misery, or to set it aside and let it continue the slow process of dying, as it was doing before I intervened, however unfair its death is. The first was pointless. The second, I did not have the courage to do. So I went with the third. I kept it wrapped in a towel, found a quiet place in the corner of my yard hidden under trees and bushes, and left it there to rest.
 
Tomorrow I will bury it. I do not expect it lived until sunset, and if by some curse it did, I highly doubt it will survive the night despite the mild weather.
 
It is a cat. I know this. It is a kitten that never got a fair shot, born to a stray mother, likely near some trash pile that introduced the maggots. What upsets me even more than just this one kitten (which upsets me greatly as it is), is that I know it is not just this kitten, and it is not just animals trying to fend for themselves against the brutality of nature. There are people who die similarly around the world, born to horrible circumstances and given a terribly unfair lot in life until, slowly, life gives out. There is no outrage, no grief, that can match what these circumstances deserve.
 
All I want to do is go home and be loved and watch my favorite TV shows and pretend that this is not the world I live in.

Rivers

I’ve been thinking a lot about rivers lately, and not only because I’m now living in a city encircled by rivers (called “river junction” in Chinese). I’ve often believed that my life is often leading me along like a river; whenever I am most unhappy or dissatisfied with life, I need only to catch the right current again and then I feel content and fulfilled.
 
This last week has been a tumultuous week emotionally. My river was caught in some whirlpool or another as I tried to decide between following the current path of my life, or switching to starting some future plans about a year earlier. There were some internal battles, because even though this can bring some positive changes on many levels of my life, it will also mean some sacrificing and significant challenges. It also is the start of a job application process, which is full of me questioning my self-worth as I am cut up, analyzed, and put on a well-formated paper with clean little sentences and phrases.
 
Yesterday, however, I felt like a found the current again — not the current I was contentedly traveling, but a new one entirely, one that took some soul-searching to find, and one that will involve a good deal of risk. (If I don’t get a job, I’m going to be pretty stuck.)
 
Lately, I’ve been singing the following two songs to myself. I wrote them years ago in middle school and high school, and I don’t think they’ve ever been more relevant in my life. It’s like they were written precisely for my present self and situation. Unfortunately there’s a missing stanza that I can’t remember, and I don’t know where a written version of it is.
 
—
 
River, river, guide me
River, river, take me home
There is someone waiting
For the moment I will come
River, river, guide me
Be my road and take me home
 
River, river, guide me
River, river, take me home
Obstacles before me
Break beneath the river’s load
River, river, guide me
Break the stones upon my road
 
—
 
If in your youth you set off for
The things that you had never seen
Don’t fear, my child, just go before
The river ever flowing
 
(missing stanza)
 
It’s been so long since we have seen our home
We ache to be there evermore
And if we once again should travel far
The river would guide us as before
 
So home make ready for the grand return
Prepare the feast, the dance and song
Though once we cried that we had lost the way
The river was with us all along

My painting teacher

One of the things I’m doing here is learning traditional Chinese painting. My favorite part about class is watching my teacher. After he has carefully filled a brush with color and has assured it has the proper amount of water, he leans over the paper, brush in hand, ready yet waiting. His eyes flit about the paper, the brush in his hand giving away his thoughts as it moves slightly left, then over, then upwards, because he’s looking for the right place to paint whatever he is about to paint (a new leaf, a swallow, a flower bud, etc).
 
Actually, it doesn’t seem like he’s looking for the spot. It almost seems like he’s listening for something. His searching is less active and more intuitive. He’s listening for the right chord, feeling for the right spot, internally painting every option with his mind’s eye until *there* — he has found it. Here, of course, is where the new leaf was meant to grow. And of course, there is where the flower bud was always meant to blossom.
 
When he paints, he isn’t the decider, the master of what he creates. He is the listener, eagerly following the guide that only he can hear. I have rarely seen so clearly the idea of one’s muse; there really seems to be a guiding force that he alone can hear, he alone will follow.
 
I want to listen, and yet rarely give myself the time to.