Last couple of months have been tough! I’ve been surrounded by death itself or impending death. Half a dozen good friends have passed – two folks I knew from school, a couple of old work buddies, and two ladies in the neighborhood. Add to this 4 co-workers of my wife’s, and it’s been a rather serious autumn. My mother is hanging on for dear life at 97, I have a very sick aunt, and we know of two terminal cancer victims. But I’m not finished yet. Several friends have lost parents, a couple of businesses have failed, old people I know keep falling, and a car accident did some unfortunate damage to three friends of the family. There. That’s it. But what’s next?
Frankly, I haven’t felt much like writing or even talking about the paranormal because so much of it is centered around death, and I’ve had my fill! I just want all this doom and gloom to pass and stay as far away from me as possible. It kinda feels like I could be next, ya know? I’m not immune. I’m already older than several of the recently departed, and I don’t like the odds. Normally I wouldn’t worry about such things but today could be “the” day, ya know? My standard outlook on life isn’t typically dark and gray; I’m not afraid ghouls will take over my brain or that zombies will eat it, but there are no guarantees. There have been 199 Friday 13th’s since I was born, so what might number 200 have in store? A marauding bus on the rampage? An escaped convict with a 38? I could get food poisoning at my local fast food giant – it happens. Anything can happen for that matter, and you know I’m right!
Luckily, it hasn’t yet. I’m still well, and I promise to never leave the house without a month’s supply of nitro pills. But even though life’s good fortune is still with me, I’d be less than honest if I didn’t admit that it’s been remarkably depressing. I don’t even like watching the news. Last week, a one year old boy was killed by some idiot crashing into a cop car (which, in turn, hit the boy). He’d just learned how to walk. And this whole ISIS thing doesn’t improve my desire to leave the house any time soon. Republicans don’t seem to be getting any better with important facts, and my recently merged bank has cost me around 500 big ones.
So who cares about ghosts and specters and aliens and furry creatures that look like blood sucking dogs and Bigfoot tracks in the garden? Truth is, no one has the inclination to care about such things when real life is so scary, but I’m trying to get my priorities back in whack. Maybe Thanksgiving will help. Christmas cheer might possibly do the trick. A few hot toddies never hurt a playa…
But all this death and stuff happens to everyone at some point in life, so why should I escape unscathed? We all lose loved ones and close friends, and we all know people going through the same thing. The number of people in my mother’s life who have died is staggering – there’s literally almost no one left. It is the way things happen; part of the cost of a long and healthy life is to watch everything around you become deceased.
In her life, she’s witnessed 24 presidential elections and 48 blue moons. It is estimated she has laughed over 600,000 times during that time, and had approximately 200,000 different dreams. There have been in excess of 305 billion lightning strikes since the day she was born and every one of them missed her, while over 4.5 trillion chickens have been killed in the name of dinner. The actuarial table of her estimated life expectancy bottomed out quite some time ago – it currently predicts her death will occur “today.” So what the heck do I have to complain about? I’ve still got 944 Saturdays left, or so they say. We’ll see, of course, but there’s plenty of time for the paranormal. Or maybe it just doesn’t matter all that much.
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Voices From Forever by Randall Keller http://goo.gl/ZBBmj Available on Amazon
There Is No Silence by Randall Keller http://goo.gl/U6KY7 Available on Amazon.
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