Monday, July 21, 2008

Mom's look...

...the one at the moment of her death, when she lifted her head slightly, grimaced, and sank back to the pillow with a last breath and a sigh. I think it about it every couple of days. It always brings me up short. I honestly don't know what to make of it. I can posture about it; that it was like the frisson we get at the top of the roller coaster just before it falls, or it was her fear of entering the vast unknown ignorant of what is about to come, or just her mouth muscles contracting in a death rictus -- and nothing more. Or my discomfort may be rooted in what happens to those who witness the act of death when life seems to escape into thin air. I will never know or, if I do, won't be able to share what I learned. I think my distress stems from the fear that at that supreme moment, when every sentient being who has ever lived with a generous heart surely must earn the right to die in peace, she did not. But that must be wrong. It must be.