Death and Dying

Recently in my AP language arts class we have been reading quite a few essays about death and dying, specifically what stands out to me was Montague’s “Of Practice”. His essay really stood out because he made it very clear and put death into a perspective that I had not thought about before. Such as how it really only happens once, which everybody already knows that, it’s just the fact that you can’t practice death and we really don’t know what will happen after the time comes and we die. What is even worse about death is that we have no idea when it is going to come and take us away, we don’t know how long our life will be, some of us will live until we reach 100 years old. Others of us might die tomorrow.
I think that it is absolutely terrible when a young person dies (really when anybody dies) but when a young person is so close to achieving what they have been waiting for, for years, I’m talking about graduation, when a student dies. They have their entire life ahead of them. And after graduation life really is just starting. Also when a really young child dies, that is about the worst that can happen because they are the ones with their whole future in front of them.
It really makes me think of how important every day is, and why we should not hold grudges, and why we should forgive. Staying mad at somebody does not do you any good. As a quote from one of my favorite books "The Five People You Meet in Heaven" "Holding anger is a poison...It eats you from inside...We think that by hating someone we hurt them...But hatred is a curved blade...and the harm we do to others...we also do to ourselves”. Life really is way to short to be mad.
I am very fortunate because I have not lost any body extremely close to me, besides my grandparents. I could not imagine losing a parent, a sibling, a best friend, or a boyfriend. Just to think about it makes me think how important all of the people in my life really are. Even if you don’t get along with some one 100% of the time, you still love them more than anything, and could not picture your life without them, and those people that are you met along the way of your journey through life, you cant remember life without them.
I cannot begin to explain my sympathy to all the families and friends out there that has had to go through something this terrible. My support goes out to anyone and everyone that has ever lost a loved one.