More on the Fleeting Nature of Life

Michael Scaperlanda’s sobering reminder of the fleeting nature of life was poignantly timely for me. I have been thinking along similar lines over the past couple of days. For me, this increased awareness of mortality began with a comedic error that prematurely announced my passing. But the episode has also unsettled me, forcing a pause in my daily routines and challenging my assumptions that there will always be another day.

Although I grew up in Wisconsin (until half-way through my junior year), I actually graduated from Beaverhead County High School in Dillon, Montana. Yesterday, I happened to send a greeting by email to an old friend from my Montana high school days with whom I hadn’t corresponded in a few years. To say that he was “shocked, shocked” to hear from me would be an understatement. To explain the source of his astonishment, he referred me to a classmates update booklet that had been distributed at the 30-year high school reunion held last summer in Dillon. (I had not been invited to the reunion – and now I guess I know why).

As you can see in the picture posted immediately below, the second page of the reunion booklet displays my old high school yearbook picture as part of a memorial to “Our Departed Classmates.” (And, yes, that is an accurate depiction of how I looked in high school in 1978 – in fact,I had cut my hair short for graduation picture day).

 

After confirming this was not a practical joke, I learned that the reunion committee had received a confidently-expressed report that I had passed away. Indeed, I was told that several stories circulated at the reunion about the cause of my death. I wish that those stories of my death had been about how I had dived into a raging river to save drowning children or how I had rushed into a burning building to rescue a trapped person. Instead, as I gather, the story with the most legs was that I had died several years ago after a massive asthma attack. Given that I’ve never had asthma and remain pretty healthy (although I sure could lose a few pounds), I have no idea where or how this tale originated.

At first, I saw only the humor in the affair. After all, it allowed me to dust off that classic Mark Twain gem: “The rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated.” The incident also prompted me to touch base with a few others from my Montana days. (And I’m pleased to say that they all were delighted to learn that I remained in the Land of the Living – or at least they were kind enough to say so.)

Later, however, I found myself feeling a little disturbed, even queasy about, this episode. It is more than passing strange to realize that, for almost a year, dozens of people have been thinking of me only in the past tense. And reading the reunion booklet was a little like reading one’s own obituary. (In addition to my portrait appearing on the memorial page, the booklet lists all classmates in alphabetical order with information about their jobs, families, and lives. The listing for me reads simply “DECEASED.”) It was all starting to become a little creepy.

As Michael well says, we should never forget the “fleeting nature” of our own lives and must come to terms with the fact that, in only a century, little trace is likely to remain of us. As a group of legal professionals and academics whose vocation is to work toward a better world and a stronger society, we are called to think about and plan for the future. But we should also remember to live for today, never missing the daily opportunities to care for the most importantthings in our lives, that is,the people around us. We were never promised an unlimited store of tomorrows. Even if it was premature in my case on this occasion, we all someday will be the subject of a picture on a memorial page or in an obituary.

Is it morbid to think along these lines? It certainly can be. And I am not suggesting that we dwell on our inevitable demise (although I could hardly avoid it these past couple of days). Instead, even as we rely upon the promise that death is not the end, we should we recall our mortality for the very purpose of making our days count and for strengthening our daily communion with those brought into our lives.

Greg Sisk