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Wednesday, July 18, 2018

I Mentioned Watching Twilight Zone: Rod Serling's Lost Classics

last night.  There is a reason that Rod Serling's early death was such a disaster to the arts, and this one of them.  The first of the story's either a descent into mental illness, or a supernatural discovery of dangerous predestination as were many of the episodes of the original series.  The second story is one of those reminders of how much of the mainstream of our culture has changed over time.  Like many of Serling's stories, death is an inevitable process not to be feared, even if there is nothing afterwards, but as one line observes, "like going to sleep after a long and tiring day."  In this Serling captured well the dominant Judeo-Christian perspective of Western Civilization even ignoring the assumption in Daniel 12:2:
Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt.
The older and sicker you get, the less frightening death becomes: only the prospect of a painful death remains truly frightening.  I have obviously spent a lot of time contemplating the inevitable since my 2013 aortic valve replacement.  Even without the hope of John 10:28:
I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand.
Death becomes more and more: "like going to sleep after a long and tiring day."

Along with the Good News, the good news is that since I started on the iron supplements this morning (and a wonderful medium rare steak tonight), many of the symptoms have been alleviating.
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2 comments:

  1. SebastianJuly 18, 2018 at 10:51 PM

    I'm not there yet. I went from not really worrying about health a few years ago to being very concerned about it. But probably not concerned enough to make the changes I know I need to make. I take the medication they tell me to take, and I'll get that walking program started next week.

    Since being hospitalized for Afib last summer, I'm now keenly aware that serious health issues can come just right out of the blue. So now when I go to sleep, I actually do think "What if I don't wake up?" Before I'd get a bit of heartburn or gas, and shrug it off. Now I wonder whether I should go to the hospital. Sleep on my arm wrong and wake up with it numb? Had it happen all the time when I was young and just shrugged it off. Now I wake up like that and I'm screaming "Stroke!" until I wake up enough to realize that everything is actually fine.

    I do worry about not waking up. Not for me. If I don't, it won't be my problem. But I feel there's a lot of unfinished business I'd rather not leave laying about.

    ReplyDelete
  2. BFRJuly 19, 2018 at 11:52 AM

    Be careful with the iron. It can affect gastric motility (constipating).

    Increased water and fiber help.

    ReplyDelete