Today's class topic in these sessions I am required to complete, was a stress assessment of both positive and negative stressors in our lives. Our window of assessment was the last 12 months. One of the inventory items with a higher point-value was "Death of a family member or close friend." I skipped over that one, but then realized I needed to check that item off. 4... 5... 6.. 7... times. I don't know, I ran out of fingers/ patience in remembering.

It is hard to explain my views on life and death without sounding totally insensitive. Philosophical -vs- actual in-the-moment feelings are very different, as well. Let me just preface my thoughts with this: I was neither extended nor taught empathy or compassion as I was growing up. Without getting into the inner workings of my family or history = These feelings are not natural or innate to me. That's not to say that I'm a pre-programmed robot with no feelings; the things I do feel, I feel very strongly. I also moved around a lot as a child, so the way I develop, and the time it takes me to develop, normal bonds or attachments to people, is completely skewed. Thus there are certain areas of human emotions that are very gray and/or incongruous, or may manifest in ways that seem inappropriate. The way I developed some sense of empathy was from a lot of stumbling, trial and error, coming from a place that was very alone, and being drawn to other people who were, despite whatever surface noise or clamour, also somehow very alone. Compassion, unfortunately, is one I'm still working on. Norton's wake, in fact, was the first time I have ever cried at a service. That was a very organic, and uncontrollable reaction. It was the first time I have gone through this process with a more solid understanding of life and people, of good, and of the impact one true heart has on all of us, and actually had the emotional resources available to comprehend and process this.

We had a fill-in instructor today, as our normal counselor is out. This new woman very much had a heart of gold, but was a typical earnest head shrinker. Please don't recite shit to me I learned while I was still in the undergrad Psychology program. Anyway. So as I'm reading the items I checked off, she asks... "How do you feel about these people dying, how do you cope or how do you pay tribute..." OK fair enough. But then she asks, "Does it make you sense your own mortality and wow *takes a deep breath* it really makes us think, was it too soon? Is life too fast? Do you feel bad that they went too soon or it wasn't fair?"

Listen bitch, "fair" - ? Honestly? Tell me you didn't just say that. I tried to explain, "My grief is in the very pragmatic, daily cycle, such as missing the interactions with these people and the things they brought that enriched life on a day to day basis." Over the years, I have lost my idealized, hyper-romanticized over-indulgence of my own capacity for grief and despair. I just don't have time for that shit anymore.

She starts babbling again. I re-focus, "I feel their loss day by day. That's all I can do - Life is just a series of days, an indefinite number. I don't go, 'shit if I die tomorrow that will suck,' because obviously I will be dead, so I can't look back and go, 'fuck, I forgot to return that shit to Nordstroms and pay someone back that $5 before I died.' - I've never been under the impression that we will be here forever, nor do I want to be."

She sort of cocked her head to the side and tried to paraphrase, to show she was actively listening to me, but at that point my turn was over, there was no need to drag out what is incomprehensible to myself, much less to other people. When someone says "it was too soon --" this is a phrase that confuses me, in a very sincere , philosophical way. Too soon for what? For how much longer we would be comfortable experiencing the other person in our life? Yes there are people that make huge contributions to life and to our hearts and to the world, and have so much potential, but "too soon" - ? Yes, there are a million and one things I would like to do and experience before I die. I will do as many as I can, but I'm not going to rush around to do it before any certain time, and when I'm dead, I definitely won't know that I missed some along the way.

I sometimes feel that people have this expectation for when it is "OK" to die - that too "soon" will mean they are not "ready." Like, what? Not ready as in, you're planning on walking into cross traffic but haven't prepared to step off the curb yet? You get "ready" to move by packing boxes, "ready" for work by getting dressed and brushing your teeth. When it comes to death, you don't get "ready" for that shit. It is never "OK" or not "OK" to die, or for someone else to die. We place these expectations on death as if our ability to cope with it has some sort of constraint on the time frame, demanding that an inevitable and unpredictable act fall within the tethers of our moral and emotional comprehension.

I realize this may come across as a) that I don't care about people or death and/or b) as incredibly offensive to those who have lost someone, or multiple someones, especially recently. Like I said, my feelings are no more or less sincere, I just arrive at empathy and compassion via much different paths than most people. I am incredibly sad when people die, but do not express it through these overwhelming acts of grief and tears, or, especially, through shock. This is a harder circumstance to get my mind around when the death is "untimely" in terms of the method or cause of death being a completely independent factor or responsibility of another person or thing. This is not to say I am right and everyone is insane - everyone is justly entitled to their mourning processes and their feelings for others. And I am 100% willing to put it out there that this could be less an issue of people being all death-crazy, and more an issue of my ideological inflexibility toward something that hasn't happened to me yet (and that I can't do anything about anyway), and an unwillingness to be vulnerable. I am completely willing to own that if it's mine. I just think the preoccupation with whether it is "OK" or not is confusing. "God" isn't taking resumes, s/he/it doesn't care if you think it's OK.

Instead I carry the thoughts and feelings of people, both living and dead, with me each day, and think of them constantly - a conversation, an event, a color, a song, a time we crossed paths. This is the only way I know how to relate and appreciate the people and things in my life -- they saturate and humanize my every waking moment -- when for all other practical purposes I have enough defects and have both learned, and built up, an agile detachment from the rest of the world.

You win some, lose some, it's all the same to me
The pleasure is to play, it makes no difference what you say
... the only card I need is
The Ace Of Spades