Ronni, I always enjoying listening to the repartee between you and Alex.

When you mentioned that at your very end, the thought that you won't care because you imagine just wanting "to get out of it" (my words), I thought back on some of my mother's final words , just over two months ago, when she died, over a 10 day period, at 97-1/2:

Early on, "this is peculiar". . .then she was "on the golden staircase"--and went back to sleep. When she woke, I mentioned the golden staircase and she said "what are you talking about?" After being moved into hospice and going through a restless period, she mumbled, "this dying is hard. . .wrap me in a shroud and obliterate me!" I wish now I'd written down everything but I didn't. I think her last words were "I love you too" as the last couple days she said nothing.

Deathing does seem so like a process you work at--kind of the reverse of the process of giving birth--and maybe going down the birth canal? Unless it's a traumatic death, the result of an accident.

I'm nor sure what this is really appropos of--just the thoughts your comment triggered. I grateful you're taking us on this journey with you.

Thank you for sharing your journey. I need to learn and you are a gifted, caring teacher.

This is your process, not anyone else's, so it is completely unique to you...including your sharing here, and reading our comments from our own processes. I guess what I'm saying is that you can't walk in anyone else's footprints on this path. I even saw a quote (I think Joseph Campbell) who said something like "You are not walking on your path, because it's being created with each of your steps." Another quote that I love is from Richard Alpert (Ram Das) "We are all just walking each other home." Whatever happens, it's just right.

Ronnie, The American Buddhist teacher Stephen Levine wrote several books for the dying. Healing into Life and Death, and A Year to Live are two. I read much of the first aloud to a dear friend who was given a (mistaken) diagnosis of having only a year to live.

Loving every day you are writing. I hope a good friend maintains this blog as an archive so your wisdom, and that of the community here, remains available for the masses who are entering old age now.

Love.

Look up Deathtalkproject.com and PDX Death Cafe (also on Facebook) for a group of people who gather online and/ or in person. Non-religious, no agenda, volunteer facilitators.

Much love.

I bought myself a funeral a couple of years ago. The funeral director assured me that, if I didn't use it, I could get my money back. You have no idea how comforting that is.

I would like to offer one brief personal experience, Ronni, that completely changed my own view of this event that awaits us all. When we knew my husband's time was short, he wanted to be at home, in his own bed and house. Long story/short version...we got it done in 24 hours with the help of the Hospice RN.

He settled in like a child happy to be home. With a hospital bed and his O2, things seemed doable even though I was alone. Later that evening I heard his voice and went to see about it. I ask what he needed, water? a blanket? the usual? He put up his hand like a policeman at an intersection calmly saying "Shhhh! I'm getting instructions !" A short time later, drifted into sleep.

I have never forgotten the power of that moment for me. It seems like his last, best gift to me. He was a pragmatic, intelligent, engineer with no religious beliefs or interest and fully cognitive until the very last.

He died in his sleep 10 hours later and yes, after 56 years married, Donald Hall's words you shared last week speak to me also. " His presence is.... his absence." It comes and goes, and then I pull back into my current reality again. You know the one...wondering what is next? Will we get instructions? Oh Lordy, I hope so.

Since my mind pingpongs now, without such a diagnosis, I can imagine my thoughts and actions will be pingponging then as well. About 5 years ago I donated my body to Emory for something or other. Once that activity is over (manipulating my dead body somehow) I'll be incinerated with a bunch of other people.

I'm a Unitarian Universalist and can write down my wishes for a memorial service. I'm not ready to do that yet, mostly because I expect to change my list of music over time.

Buddhists put a lot of time and effort into the death process. They seem to have a pretty good handle on it and what comes after. Might be worth checking into this.

There is at least one Republican on Ronnie's ship. I can see it now: Man Overboard!

When I went for grief counseling after Dad died (I also joined a grief support group), I was told I saw what was behind the curtain. When I later shared this with friends, I was asked what this meant? I thought the meaning was obvious? I guess people don't understand until they go thru it. We don't talk about aging and we don't talk about dying. We talk amongst ourselves but people either have a fairy tale view of it or are in denial. I was given a booklet by the hospice. I just didn't know what to expect. It helped. I hope I was able to make Dad's last days comfortable. He died at home.

I talked alot about death after my fiance died . I had to stop because I could tell it made people uncomfortable.

I look forward to your sharing, Ronni. Your blog is so important.

BTW, I love hearing New Yorkers talk about DT. Because DT is from NYC and New Yorkers have known him a long time.

It,s 7.30am here in south west Turkey and I am drinking coffee on the terrace having found your news via a Twitter alert in my email inbox. I am fine, going to four yoga classes each week and contemplating winter now the tourist season here officially ended yesterday. And you are not so fine. It was a shock getting your news but you will handle it. I can now control my ping pong mind to a certain extent by using breathing/meditation techniques learned in yoga. The saddest thing for me is that we now shall never meet. For years I have had a fantasy of you coming to visit and me showing you the beautiful place I am so lucky to live in. But not to worry as I'm sure not having visited Turkey is low on your list of things you regret, if it features at all. I shall try to be better at following your blog from now on and you may, note the indefinite usage, get emails with pics from my travels. I shall definitely pop up in your comments again. And you will be fine.

Ronni:

I don't believe I've ever commented here before, but I've been checking in on Time Goes By regularly since I first ran across it in my 40s. I loved that you were writing about a topic that is so often ignored.

Now, I am the age that you were when you first looked around that newsroom and realized you were the oldest person in the room. I want you to know that your writing has had a positive impact on my life, and on how I am approaching aging. I like to think that -- because of TGB -- I am trying to approach aging mindfully and with purpose.

Thank you for all that you've shared over the years.

Ronnie, I was thinking about you this evening, and I think you could say "Timor mortis conturbat me". Getting really close to death, feeling its breath on your neck, is destabilizing. It's chilling. Everything else is little. It's what Emily Dickinson called "zero at the bone". All the crap we use to get through our lives flies past us like - yes - ping pong balls. No one cares if my ceiling fan is clean, in other words. No one ever did.

It helps me, sometimes, to try to imagine being a cat. I eat, I sleep , I stretch, I wash and nothing else crosses my mind. I can't possibly actually achieve that state of mind, being consumed with anxiety as we humans are, but imagining it can give me temporary peace. I think that is a big part of why most of us like being around animals and especially cats, who are not programmed to please anyone but themselves. So utterly honest, in the moment, going to do what they need to do. So you are going to do what you need to do. Break it down into small physical steps?

Oh well, I'm wittering on. Just know that right now I see your face in my mind's eye.

For all the [many] articles, studies and news stories I've read about ageing, death and dying, there is hardly anything written by or for the dying person. This is so true and really bothered me when I was told I only had palliative options remaining. I looked for insights, and there are a few memoirs about the journey but what really bothered me is that almost all of the information on hospice and palliative care and death and dying are addressing the carers challenges and what to expect. So even finding good information about what symptoms I can be aware of, or pain management etc. was read from the perspective of listening in at a door while other people discuss what's to come. I've been blessed with much more time than I was told I would have, and that's been interesting. Now I think the reason there are fewer patient voices telling these end of life stories is because those people are too busy squeezing the marrow out of the life they have left. I know I thought, "someone should write ___ book!" And for a day or so sometimes I thought it should be me since I've gotten this extra time already. But then I think I'd rather drink tea and eat cakes with my niece.