The following is
Essay #2, One Flu Over The Dang Fool Test, of Dr. Ring's new book,
Waiting to Die: A Near-Death Researcher's
(Mostly Humorous) Reflections on His Own
Endgame.
I might have
been a tad too glib when in the first
installment of what clearly will be a
terminal series having to do with my
personal terminus, I observed that at least
for me waiting to die was rather boring.
After this
winter, I have had cause to change my mind.
For a while there, I thought it might be
more of a matter of life or death. I found
myself thinking of the line Othello sings
toward the end of Verdi's opera as he
contemplates his own death:
"Ecco la fine
del mio camin." Colloquially, "This is the
end of the line for me." |
You see, I was
one of the millions who caught the flu bug
or, rather, it caught me. And held me tight
for a while in what seemed to be its
death-like grip. It was really bad for a
week or ten days there -- it's hard to
remember how long. Even now, five weeks to
the day after becoming sick, I am still
hawking and spitting up gobs of sputum, and
my voice now resembles that of your nearby
frog. There were times when I considered
whether the first piece I wrote in the
series might well turn out to be my epitaph.
And I admit there were moments, or really
days, when I felt it didn't matter if that
were the case since I was past caring
whether I lived or died. La vie ou la mort,
c'est la même chose.
I also thought
ruefully that it is wise to be careful what
you write about. Magical thinking or not,
someone might be listening.
I remember not
long after I had completed my research
having to do with near-death experiences in
the blind, I developed glaucoma, and as a
result I am now virtually blind in my right
eye and have since had a series of other
ocular maladies. I'm just glad I didn't
choose to research gonorrhea.
There are other
well-known stories about people tempting the
devil and then having to consort with him to
their infinite regret.
For example, in
1904,
Gustav Mahler was working on a song
cycle called
Kindertotenlieder (songs on the
death of children). As it happened, this was
only two weeks after the birth of his second
child. The timing as well as the content of
the work greatly upset Mahler's wife, Alma,
who felt that the composer was tempting
Providence. And sure enough, four years
later, his daughter was dead of scarlet
fever, devastating both him and his
prescient wife.
But thinking
about death, as I have often had occasion to
do, both in connection with my many years of
studying near-death experiences and as a
result of nearing my own demise, however
uncertain the date, can't help but conjure
up certain images.
For the last
several years, this is one that has often
occurred to me. I am in a forest surrounded
by comrades. We are all fighting an unknown
enemy who keeps shooting at us. I see some
of my comrades fall and die; others are
wounded and lie bloody on the ground. I keep
moving, hoping that no bullet will strike
me.
And isn't this
like life itself where death is the enemy
whose bullets no one can dodge forever? We
are in a war against death, and as we get
older, more of our comrades succumb or if
they don't die, they become disabled, infirm
or demented. Or sometimes they barely escape
themselves, as happened recently to a good
friend of mine, almost exactly my age, who
became ill with the flu at almost the same
time I did but whose experience was far
worse. Not knowing of his illness, I had
written him on his birthday and expressed
the hope that all was well with him. When he
was again well enough to write, even though
he was still not recovered, this is what he
told me.
At just about
the time that you are hoping that I am
having a better time than you are, I am
being stricken with overpowering symptoms of
the same malady. I take a few sleeping pills
and hit the sack, determined to ignore it.
Alas, I awaken the next morning with high
fever, urine-soaked bed, pounding headache,
wicked aches and pains, and inability even
to arise from the bed and make it to the
bathroom. Off I go in an ambulance to the
hospital, where they wheel me in to the ER
for extended tests and treatment. Turns out
that I too have the flu, but of a most
severe strain. For more than a week after
they get me back home I was literally
bouncing off the walls, being unable to lift
myself off the floor once I had arrived
there, totally unable to control my urine,
only semiconscious of what was happening
around me, ignorant as to what day of the
week it was or whether it was day or night,
unable to grasp anything without dropping
it, and so on.
I shuddered and
almost cried when I received my friend's
e-mail. There, but for the grace of God,
etc. My friend survived and was able to
dodge death's bullet, but I could easily
have lost my beloved comrade. Death is all
around us, but mostly we can pretend it
isn't -- except when it comes close or
someone dear to us does die. Then we
remember. When you get old, you have lots of
such reminders.
Meanwhile, now
that I've largely recovered from the flu, I
have resumed some of my own preparations for
death or taken measures to deal with my
increasing physical limitations.
One set has to
do with my vision, which although it is not
yet deteriorated to a point where it is
really worrying me, has declined
significantly during the last year. As a
result, I can now drive only locally and
then just during daylight hours and have to
depend more on the kindness of my girlfriend
and sometimes often friends to tote me
around.
My visual
difficulties have also forced me to succumb
to the lure of personal entertainment
devices that have become so ubiquitous in
the early part of the twenty-first century.
In my case, I have just acquired an iPad so
I can more easily read my favorite magazines
and novels. I regard this as still another
personal defeat and humiliation. I never
wanted to become "one of those people."
And to spare my
heirs the trouble, I am now in the process
of giving away all my professional books and
eventually my entire library. I have a large
archive, too, much of which I will probably
trash as I have not yet been flooded with
offers from potential biographers to write
my life story.
Downsizing and
letting go -- that's the name of the game
I'm playing these days. Another means of
making way for death.
Other factors --
let's not go too much into those depressing
details -- have also made it increasingly
difficult for me to travel, so I'm mostly
restricted just to my locality in the Bay
Area. I used to love to travel and have
traveled widely, but now I have to get used
to promenading around my own neighborhood
--literally -- as I have become something of
a tottering boulevardier in my declining
years. All that's missing is an elegant cane
and a top hat.
Another doleful
sign of the end times (mine, not the
world's) is that increasingly I find myself
thinking of people from my past who played
an important part of my life. Actually, this
isn't really a melancholy preoccupation at
all. Because I often think of them with
strong feelings of gratitude, as if I am in
a sense saying farewell to them and thanking
them, as it were, for all they have done for
me. The other night, for example, in a
conversation with girlfriend about my early
days as a graduate student, I spent a long
time talking about my major professor,
Harold H. Kelley, a distinguished social
psychologist, whose personal care for and
interest in me helped me survive a deep
crisis of confidence not long after I
arrived in graduate school. Kelley was
venerated in his lifetime, not only for his
important work but for his warm and caring
nature. He saved my ass, and I will always
be indebted to him.
Many years
later, after I had become known for my work
on near-death experiences, we happened to
meet at a conference. He was much the same
in his manner and friendliness, and I had a
chance to tell him then, awkwardly, I'm
sure, how much he meant to me. I still felt
like his grateful student, and I was.
But I am not
only thinking about the past. I am thinking
about my future, too. Not here, but there.
And about my father from whom I was
separated at an early age and who died
young. I have missed him my entire life and
wonder whether I will soon be seeing him
again.
Some years ago,
as a result of a really bizarre set of
circumstances, I happened to get a reading
from a medium -- the only one I have ever
had -- and my dad came through.
At one point I
asked the medium whether she could give me
any information about my father. This is
what she told me. (My responses are in
parentheses.)
Well, first of
all, I feel like he crosses before his time.
Somehow you and he had abbreviated time
together. (That's very true.)
And I hear an
apology for that. He apologizes to you,
that's what I'm getting. To me, it's like in
a way he was letting you down. This could be
like he crossed without having enough time
with you as father. It's like, "I'm sorry."
He crossed very quickly, too. (Yes.)
Was
that from a heart attack? (Exactly.)
OK, and
there was no goodbye, correct? (That's
right.)
And you were much younger, right?
(True.) [I was 17 when he died.]
I just feel
like there's an apology for that. I feel
like he's saying he should have taken care
of his health better. I don't feel that he's
that old when he crosses at all. [He was 41,
just as his career as an artist was taking
off.] There's a tragedy around him. (Yes.) |
After she gave
me a good deal of evidential information
about my father, she added this:
It's also
interesting in that he says he helps you
with your work from the other side. Somehow
organizes things on the other side that
helps your work here, you understand? Were
you -- this is going to sound bizarre -- OK,
were you on Larry King or something? (That's
amazing, yes, I was on Larry King.)
Really??
Was this like 20 years ago? [Damn close --
it was in 1992, 19 years ago.]
I'm getting
something like, your dad helped to arrange
getting you on Larry King. I was arguing
with him, "What, Larry King?" I thought
maybe I was getting it wrong.
(So he's
helping me?)
And he has helped you. He's
helped you for twenty years. Because he
couldn't do it here physically, he's had to
do it from the other side.
[I always felt
this and several years ago wrote a memoir
about my dad whose main theme was my sense
that he had been a continuing, loving and
guiding presence in my life.]
|
Toward the end
of the reading, I couldn't help asking the
medium a question, which coming from me,
will make you laugh:
(I'd like to
know in the unlikely event of my death, will
I see my father or will I have some
connection to the various people you
described to me?) Well, absolutely, but he's
laughing at you!
"You are asking me that
when you already know the answer to that!"
I
mean, he's joking with me, and he sighs, and
says [apparently tongue-in-cosmic-cheek],
First, there's going to be a tunnel, and
then, if you like, I'll greet you first, and
then you're going to see all of us there..."
It's almost like he's laughing at you, you
understand.
|
Recently, I
completed a little memoir I called Pieces of
My Mind Before I Fall to Pieces, and at the
very end, I wrote these lines, again about
my father:
Throughout my
life, I feel that I have been looked after
and guided, not only by many friends and
relatives as well as my various mentors, but
by invisible agencies, not least of whom is
my father, who have watched over me and
protected me. A foolish man like me could
not have made it through life without
assistance from those tasked with looking
after me from some unknowable elsewhere.
Of course, my
time is limited (everyone's is, to be sure,
but when you're in your early eighties, you
are more aware that the sands of time are
rapidly ebbing), and I'm mindful that I am
now very close to my goal of living to be
1000 months old. My health, fortunately, is
still tolerably good, but one never knows
when the man with the scythe will show up at
one's door saying, "it's time." When he
comes, I trust I will be ready -- ready to
take my next adventure.
As I have said,
I hope when that time comes, I will be
seeing my father again. As it happens, I am
finishing up the last stages of this book on
his birthday.
Happy birthday,
dad. See you soon!
|
Kenneth Ring's New Book:
Waiting to Die:
A Near-Death Researcher's (Mostly Humorous)
Reflections on His Own Endgame
|