death
I claim I'm not morbid, just realistic. once upon a time I had just finished the first grade, and hadn't yet started the second grade and concluded that schools were just stupid, and no wonder grownups acted like they did. (second grade started with my third reading of "Run Dick, run." I had thought two readings were beyond stupidity.) I went to a hospital for a week - or it felt like a week - for a boodle of tests. you see, I had been born with a heart murmur, and back in 1949 or so, that was A Bad Thing. after the tests, the doctors and my father gathered near the door to my hospital room, and talked without moving their lips. talked very quietly so all I could hear was their murmuring. then the doctors watched while my father came over to talk to me. I don't think my father had much empathy, on the other hand he was a very successful missionary and preacher and even trouble-shooter for the Southern Baptist Foreign Mission Board, so he may have been empathetic as hell when he was god-manning, and completely without when he was fathering. in any case, he explained to me that my heart murmur meant I was a very sick boy, and that I mustn't ever run again, or jump, or climb, or somersault, or turn cartwheels, or spin til I was dizzy, or do any boy things. I remember hearing it like a death sentence, my father the judge, and all those doctors the jury. I was stunned, unbelieving yet believing, and lay there trying to imagine what life they had left me. would I embroider rigorous patterns on pillow cases? would I sew pretty clothes for other people to wear while they did fun things? would I watch out a window while other kids ran, jumped, climbed, turned somersaults, or cartwheels? take this with a grain of salt, maybe a pound of it. I think I turned my back on the door, and saw death sitting there in the chair beside my bed, but death wasn't reaching for me, just watching me. and then death was gone. I think someone turned out the lights when the grownups left the room - which meant the room went from half-bright to dim. I think I lay there in the twilight, indignant and pissed off. I think I didn't yet have language like "pissed off", but I knew the feeling. I think I remembered and savored remembering running and jumping and climbing and somersaulting and cartwheeling. I had done that a lot before I came to that hospital. I had never died. I had never felt sick. why the hell would I do either now? (I was born into a Southern Baptist family, I knew words like hell.) all that disappointment and betrayal and hurt flashed into anger. "F**k you!" I told my father and his doctors, even though they weren't there any more, even though I didn't have that language, but I sure as hell had that spirit. "I damn sure will do any of those, all of those." and I did. I ran, I jumped, I climbed, I somersaulted, I cartwheeled, I sword-fought using palm-fronds we'd hacked into swords. I played soccer or did what clumsy kids do while other kids are playing soccer. I crawled into what I thought were parts of the jungle. I out-boyed most boys my age. or at least most boys I knew, I not only did things I had explicitly been told not to do, I did things other boys had been told not to do. I was not a hellion. I didn't defy grownups. I waited til they were out of sight, then did what they'd forbidden. I walked up to Brasilian grownups in neighborhoods I wasn't supposed to be in, and asked them what they were doing, and sometimes asked if I could help. secretly I defied UnitedStatesian grownups a lot! and I lived just fine. I do remember that if I looked over my left shoulder, I often thought I saw death sitting and watching me, but death never reached for me. I think I grinned at death a lot. we weren't friends, but he wasn't my enemy either, not like those pesky UnitedStatesian grownups with their lists of what I mustn't do - which I then had to do. death was just there. a presence. death hasn't reached for me yet, but I think death sits a little closer these days. I still grin at death, and keep doing what I'm doing. I appreciate death. I wouldn't have had the life I've had if those doctors and my father hadn't tried to make death the threat they thought death should be.
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