Memento Mori

There are three types of people in this world. Those you’ve never met nor heard of. Those you’ve not met but whose names you know. And those whose actions have directly touched you, for better or for worse.

And there are two categories of the latter. Those whose death you have been prepared for, by age or illness. And those whose death comes unexpectedly, and far too soon.

If there is a land of the dead, souls there must surely celebrate each passing, as it increases their number and adds new stories of experiences past.

But here in the land of the living, we can only mourn their loss. Then, after a time, we turn our faces again to the future. For ours are survivors’ tales.

And in this as well are two categories of people, the pragmatist, and the idealist. You cannot change their basic nature, though you may appeal for a moment to their grasp of the other. And so the pragmatist grieves awhile. And the idealist is coaxed to cease grieving and move on.

I am by nature an idealist. Were I a god, this is not the world I would have made. For existence to include suffering and sorrow seems appalling. I can only dream of other worlds, and strive to make ours more like those.

As an idealist, then, I pick up the pen again today to work at creating. Though the pragmatist in me acknowledges the sorrow behind, and recognizes that there is also, inevitably, sorrow yet ahead.