Down Deep, You Dig

Dear Maria,

Well, I figured you have been busy. I may be unencumbered, but I do understand, still. First, glad to hear you are mostly happy and well. Of course, a little sadness seems inevitable if you are at all sensitive and take a look at the world as it goes from time to time.

As for thanking me for sharing my thoughts and feelings, you are welcome. Folks did once upon a time share verbally, but now few talk and nearly everything is a matter of record in texts and emails, etc. Has it made us more skittish? Maybe. I figure either I trust folks and trust my instincts or I tiptoe through life as nothing more than a minefield of gotchas. I’m going with trust.

As you guessed, I did not see the PBS show on assisted suicide, and these hard questions you raise are beyond fathomable in any real way. I do believe that I always would put down a suffering animal, but to think of another human being and, well, the questions explode.

Maybe we go with the heart’s intentions--we are presented with choices, we pray, we cogitate, we agitate, we reflect, and then we do what we think is best for the other person. So, the drug is administered that will end another’s life as requested. Two days later, a miracle drug is released that would have kept the person alive.

Would I feel horrified for my action were I the one to have acted thus? Yes, devastated. I do not know how I would recover even as I acted to end a person’s suffering in the most moral fashion that I could based on what I could know at that moment.

This reality that I cannot possibly foresee what is around the next bend in the river, so to speak, is the central difficulty for me in this life of ours. I do not want to do harm, but I do not live and love and interact in a bubble. We are connected to each other, we need each other--others are here for us. To accept limitations, accept the unknowing, and accept that there is risk in all we say and do is a tough spot to be in when reflecting upon such ideas.

Don’t forget all the other stuff that is in the mix—the beauty of the world, the awe that is awakened by the night sky, the loveliness that attends to hearts in sync, the joy of music, the shared laughs, the triumphs. And that so much good comes at us without any foresight on our parts is also woven into the fabric of daily living.

Okay, enough. See what happens when you take a few moments to share? Maybe this is why no one wants to after all. Be well. Always yours, srk