Saturday Six - Episode #394

Not that I’m trying to connect this week’s set of questions to Halloween or anything, but death is the topic.

What can I say? Every week can’t be all fun and cheery, right?

Thanks for stopping by and playing along. And I hope you have a long, healthy life for your participation!

Be sure to check back this week and click on the links of bloggers who play along in the comments below! It’s a great way to find blogs you may not have visited and keep the conversation going!

Here are this week’s “Saturday Six” questions. Either answer the questions in a comment here, or put the answers in an entry on your blog… But don’t forget to leave a link to your blog so that everyone else can visit! Permission is not granted to copy the questions to message boards for the purpose of having members answer and play along there. Enjoy!

1. You have the chance to learn either the date, the location or the method of your death: would you accept an envelope that would contain ONE of the answers to one of those questions? And if you couldn’t choose which question would be answered? I would not accept the envelope with that information - any of that information. I try to live each day as though it were my last - why stop now if I know I'd live to be 105? If I absolutely had to accept one of the answers... I'd pick... location, I guess. I'd have to hope it is a location I frequent, so I could not guess when it would be or try to get out it... not that I could.

 

2. If you could choose to learn the answer to one of those, which would you choose? Oh, I guess I'm ahead, as always. I also had a little trouble with the original question. The answer is above.

3. Which illness do you fear most? That is a dual question. For myself, I am most afraid of what I currently have: myotonic dystrophia Type II (D-PROMM), which is scary in that there are so many variables. I might get Type II Diabetes from it. I might end up in a wheelchair from it... too many issues that are all with the word "might". I try to look on the bright side but it is not always that easy. The other answer is any kind of disease that would allow me to linger in a half-living state - i.e. cancer. I don't want to die that way.

The second part of this question is not about my own method of dying but for example my father or my husband. The disease that scares me the most, hands-down, is Alzheimer's Disease. I never want to visit my father or Luis and have them look at me and say, "Who are you?" I could not bear that.

4. Which method of death other than illness do you fear most? I really can't say that I fear death too much. I guess after riding for almost nine years, the fear of the unknown is mitigated by the fact that we have all walked people to the grave. And not often does it seem so terrible as we are inclined to think. So many times I see faces that were taught with pain, fear, uncertainty suddenly smooth out to reflect complete peace, sometimes happiness at the moment of death. What do they see, hear, feel that does that? I don't know, but it seems like a beautiful thing.

5. If you could control how you would die, what method would you choose? Anything fast and painless. Dying in my sleep of course seems ideal. But I would even be okay with a piano falling out of the sky provided I did not hear or see it coming and did not feel a thing. (That might be pushing it a bit, but you get the idea!)

6. If you could specify the age at which you die, with reasonable good health assumed, how long would you like to live? Wow, tough question. When does life become too long? Especially with the parameters above. I would say I would like to reach my centennial birthday, then not long after go quietly in my sleep. Say, 100 and nine months, to make it to October 2068 to see the leaves turn one more time.

If you have a Reader’s Choice question you’d like to see asked (and answered), send me an email! I’d love to include it in a future edition of the Saturday Six.