HOW WE DIE and how I must now serve

Two quotes from the constantly extending comment section on the HOW WE DIE post sum up first, what is going on there —

I’ve been a hospice chaplain for over 25 years, and I can’t remember when I’ve seen a better Article with such wonderful comments. — RevReif

and second my own conclusions —

I do not want my family, community of society investing $$ toward keeping me alive when my window of larger contribution has passed. Toward what end, purpose or otherwise? — Wandering Hebrew

I assumed that the synchronicity between the 4th anniversary of this blog’s start and the post on HOW WE DIE that was just starting to go viral that very day meant that I had my “sign.” I was to continue the blog, but ratchet down the time it takes me daily. (The other choice was to stop and leave the site up as an archive.)

But obviously, I do need to be careful, and much more specific, in what I ask for. Because this one post from January 19th —

How we die now; how we used to die

— is still ramping up — over twice as many views each day as the day before (over 100,000 yesterday, and over 80,000 already, at noon, today). At this point, new comments are posted every couple of minutes. And, since I moderate the first comment from each person, then I must sit here and read each new deep, heartfelt, often agonizing, story in order to “approve” it!

Hilarious, and tragic. Hilarious, that I would be “reduced” to serving in this manner, as secretary to my own blog. And tragic, that this subject of how we die now compared with how we used to die seems to be the great unmentionable that, via this one post on a heretofore relatively obscure blog, has suddenly burst into collective awareness.

For myself, I continue to be astonished at the depth of resonance this subject has called forth in the comment section. And grateful, if squirming, at the amount of work it takes me to just sit here and say yes to each one. And in awe. Mostly that. In awe of the current of profound feeling that runs through this bloody, distracting world, despite the chaotic, uncaring craziness that we witness — and, to some extent, if we are to remain alive, must engage in — on a daily basis.

Yes. In awe of our deep deep caring for one another, and our compassion, our agonized responsiveness to this most intimate of personal and interpersonal quandaries in the soulless, robotic, technological age.

I am at your service.

Bless us all.