Tales About Death (2/2)

That's what happens when you don't superwise the needs
of your Sims. Or when you even suck at cheating...

A second truth about death is that we can't really picture it. Or him. Some try to imagine "Death" as a person, mostly like some creepy dude wearing a cowl and carrying around a scythe all day who would suddenly show up if you're close to your end... to be your companion on the way to "wherever-you-are-going-to-go-now". Not sure, but I think this symbol could be also seen as a sign of a serious over-consumption of the PC game "The Sims" when I was younger...

As in contrary to the situation in Sims, you can't play about "Life or Death" with Death (himself). J.K. Rowling (you might have heard of her) came up with some pretty interesting little story. If you know her, you know, she has a thing for wizards. So the little fairytale she wrote is about three wizards, rather three brothers. Who conquered death. Just to come back to him. Sooner or later. One after another.

In case you don't know the story (or forgot it/or want to refresh it/or want to see it animated in a fancy way):

The last time I went "sleep-over babysitting" because my host mum would arrive late, I told that story as a bedtime story to my 9-year-old girl (who loooves Harry Potter, fyi). Maybe, reflecting  about it now, the story was a little inappropriate for her age. But she's a brave little cutie. And she has already heard and seen worse. 

Her dad died about 2 years ago. Sometimes, out of the blue, she asks: "Why did he die?" or she says: "Man, it sucks that my Dad is dead. He used to watch Harry Potter with me...But now Mom won't let me cause she thinks it's still too dangerous for me!" Even if Mom's right, I pity her for not having a father. 

And for having encountered death this early. Death how he is when he's the worst. When he takes home your parents, your siblings or your lovers. 

Back to the story. She asked me: "I understand: The first was punished for his avarice and the second had to understand that noone who was dead once, could ever come back to life. But the third one, the third brother...Why did he ever take off the cloak of invisibility? I don't get it".

I tried to explain to her that he decided, when he had a wife, children and a long and happy life on his back, that there was no further thing he wanted to achieve or wanted to be. He was just satisfied with everything how it was and pleased about the fact that he could end his life when he found the time was right to do it.

Why's there an ice cream cup in a blog post
about death, you're might wondering now...

I started thinking about it in a deeper way, too. Someone said to me once, that if there wasn't death, what would keep us on making our life on earth worthwhile? If there were no such thing as death, if we all could live forever (leaving out the problems caused by the overpopulation of the planet that would probably lead us to kill one another sooner or later) we would presumably do nothing. 
We would not try to make our life special or set up goals like winning the nobel prize, getting that god-damn dream job we always longed for, having the most loveable family in the world and a dog named Snoopy, eating as much Ben&Jerry's ice cream as possible troughout a life-time, or even inventing that mother of all ice cream brands...or just being happy and finding someone to love.

To me, death always remains something we should fear. Because it makes us (suddenly) lose our loved ones: friends, family and life partners. But death also shows us how important it is to demonstrate them our love, to not fight about odds and ends when you should be hugging right now. 
"To live in the Now" (as quoted from The Spectacular Now) and appreciate what you've got.

Death is the only thing that makes life worthwhile. As a conclusion, you could argue that death is the meaning of life... but the amount of irony in this statement is too damn high! (Say it in the meme you're thinking about). 

You're free to make your own conclusions about what I wrote down here recently and about your own gatherings with death. Was he nice to you? Did he let you live peacefully by now? You lucky little child. I hope you enjoy the times without him. Because death never lets you down.
I know one thing for sure: He'll be there.