Life after death and immortality
My father passed away in the recent past at the age of 87 years. He had lived a full life. In the few months leading up to his death, his quality of life had waned as his dementia condition worsened. So in many ways, my family and I had time to mentally prepare to let him go. However, there are a few things about the experience that I wasn't quite prepared for. First, the actual finality of a person's passing is incredibly stark -- the clear missing of the person's presence (even when he wasn't mentally there) is palpable -- there's no good way to truly prepare for that. When I walked by his silent and empty room, I felt his absence shouting at me as though something was amiss or misplaced in the scene. This wasn't something I would have expected. Second, ironically, I think about my dad every day now that he is dead. When he was alive, I admit to hardly having him in my thoughts for weeks on end as I live my busy life. Again, this is not something I would have