I’ve been working until 11 PM, so my mind is a little strained. While I was resting in my balcony, trying to breathe some fresh air, an ambulance just hurried past my window, making that loud noise, that I cannot stand. I suddenly felt sadness and anxiety and that’s because I associate the sound with death. When I hear it, my thoughts jump at the ones in suffering, at the family.

I’m a little bit crazy, I know already.

I’m not yet a fully grown-up, that’s for sure, but in terms of death, I’m really a child. I don’t accept death and I’m afraid of it. Mine, because I don’t want the loved ones to suffer, and the others, because I’m truly afraid, of losing them and of death itself. I’ve never seen someone die, yet I’ve taken part at many funerals.

I’ve never felt immortal, apart from early childhood. 

Do you remember the times when you were a child and you were feeling like nothing can hurt you? I was playing a lot, I was jumping from here to there, without understanding the danger. At those times, when my parents used to tell me to be careful, I was only thinking that they pester me too much.

While now, when I’m older, I understand the concern, because as we grow, we become conscious of how beautiful, but still dangerous, this world is.

My fear has its roots from my late childhood when my grandparents and my godfather died. That’s when I felt it is present and that’s probably when I truly realized that we are not immortal and that everything has an end. That’s when I started seeing it in black color.

 

I don’t see it only as a losing, but also as a presence. It kind of gives the feeling I had when I watched the horror movie The Exorcist, from 1973. It scared me to death.

You probably think that I’m that kind of girl who doesn’t watch horror movies, but you’re wrong, I watch them a lot and I enjoy them. I even want to try out the horror game Until Dawn.

 

But in horror movies death happens fast, although there’s this suspense, you already expect it to happen. Besides, in terms of feelings and mourning, the subject isn’t extended, so you see it as an irreversible and impersonal event.

Back in the days, when the technology and the medicine weren’t yet so advanced, people accepted death easier, they were accustomed to it.

 

But these days, death is a taboo subject. people avoid talking about it, in fact, I don’t think I’ve ever discussed with a friend about it. And that’s probably because everybody fears it.  

Are you afraid of death? Do you feel the same?

Illustrations by Rebecca Hendin