Death of Marla

True story of a revelation

I used to fear death when I was a boy, then I realized that there was nothing about death to be afraid of, but upon further reflection, over a decade later, it struck me that I still feared certain kinds of death.  Let me explain.

One day I met a girl named

Marla.  

She was pretty; she was quiet,

And while we sat on a bench outside an adobe house in the countryside

She revealed her thoughts and trepidations to me:

“Lucas,” she said, “I am scared of dying.”

I was taken aback... “Why,”

I asked,

“Are you afraid to die?”

While I sat next to her, looking at caramel of her irises,

Her gaze pointed at the ground by her feet,

My eyes looking at the ground and then at her eyes,

She thought long and hard

And gave me a deep answer:

“I don´t know.”

But she knew a little, and so explained everything:

“When you die, you cease

To exist.”

“Deja de existir,” she added in her native tongue.

“And I do not want that!

To cease to exist.

I want to do things.

I want to see and sense things.

I want to live.”

 

What she said

reminded me of another woman that I met a few weeks earlier.

(I forget her name)

She wants to be thirty-three

Forever.  She would have to rewind the omnipresent clock of Nature by twelve years to begin to achieve that...

“I do not want to get old

And wrinkly -look at my face now!-

And I want to be able to do so many

Things!”

“Things that will get more and more difficult as I age.”

I told her my desire to study how the brain works

And she said, full of excitement, “You must help me!

Research this-

Turn back the hands of my inner clock.”

You are crazy, I thought to myself. (And what do Malthus´ ideas have to do with your fantasy anyway?)

But I thanked her anyway for paying the cab fare home.

 

Marla,

On the other hand, was not a lunatic, since

She reminded me of me:

“I once feared death as well,” I said.

“As a child I would weep,

Sitting on the edge of my parents´ bed,

Imagining,

Hoping,

That they were on the bed with me,

And not dead,

In situations as commonplace as them going to town to buy groceries.

They said they would be back at seven,

I would tell myself,

But it is already eight thirty! Why?

What happened?

Marla looked up,

Up at the cloudy sky,

Looked at me and smiled, barely.

“Really?” she asked.

“Really,” I replied.

“But,” and this was a big but that I was laying down, “I do not fear death

Anymore.”

(I felt so proud of myself)

“I´m not scared of dying,” I repeated,

Unaware of the flaw in my reasoning that I would only realize over a decade after the first day that I started to not fear death.

“I´m just not.  If I die, so what?”  Then my logic:

“I won´t exist to worry about it,

All that matters is living La Vida Dulce!"

I hoped to have sparked deep transformative thoughts in her,

But she did not utter a single word about the topic of death again.

(Never)

After I had waited

And waited

For a response, but got only silence and a weak smile in return,

I got up to continue our trek across the farmlands.

And she got up as well

And followed.

Back to that flaw in my logic:

It is a lie for me to say:

“I do not fear death,”

I realized only today. (Better late than never!)

I brace myself for all the repercussions from this fundamental correction to one of my

Fundamental beliefs.

Repeat after myself:

I do fear death!

Not death of me,

That´s nothing, and in that case I stand by my beliefs aforementioned.

But death to others,

Because then one of the original pillars of my arguments

Falters,

Miserably.

Namely: I will be around, in this world,

To experience all worries that accompany death (of others).

The scariest thing,

About my disappointing revelation is that I have no

Excuse,

No way to argue against

Sitting on my parents´ bed, an hour and a half after they said they would return and worrying myself

(Undoubtedly the most preferable object to receive the following action, it now seems)

To death!

Author's Note

All forms of criticism welcome!