Those of us lucky enough not to have been born with life-threatening conditions, have had an extended pass from looking mortality in the face.  Many of us have embraced the can’t-get-me philosophy of our misguided youth, taking unnecessary chances for little reason and usually less reward.  But, in spite of youthful folly, if you live long enough, the end of things, of yourself, for instance, suddenly enters your consciousness with greater frequency.  I don’t know if this is a universally human obsession, but I have always had that passing dark cloud, (the ‘how can the world just go on without me when I die’ cloud), cross my quiet thoughts for as long as I can remember.  It used to be scary because of the no-more-me part, but, in my eighth decade, it’s more about the not having time to finish things and already starting to miss family and friends, (expect me to become needier and mushier in the very near future).

Here’s the part that makes no sense to me.  With the equal opportunity death thing being our most common denominator, how can so many people callously disregard their inherent responsibility to make the life thing, (present and future), better by whatever means they can contribute?  What prehistoric part of the brains of the Trumps and the Kochs and the Falwells and the McConnells and the Hannitys and the Putins and the Jung Uns, (you know I could go on), doesn’t comprehend that the greed, avarice, manipulation, dishonesty and amorality will come to an abrupt, (hopefully very painful), end when the stroke or infarction or rampant tumor growth or lightning bolt or escaped zoo lion segues them from existents to memories?  As I become more aware of my impermanence, I have become obsessed with battling for the removal of these festering warts on the goodness of humanity.  This has created a tremendous intellectual conflict. Should I spend the best of my remaining time wallowing in the wonder of the people and nature that I love, or do I devote myself to battling the dastardly forces that will worsen those lives and the environment that I leave behind?