Living Like I'm Dying

If we’ve learned anything from modern philosophy, meaning Facebook bumper stickers, Kris Allen, and inspirational posters with photos of ducklings on them, it’s to “live like we’re dying.”  I am not doing that today.

You see, I would NOT like to spend my last day on earth in this coffee shop using my iPod to drown out the three Adele songs the radio seems to be playing on repeat.  When we are told to “live each day like it’s the last,” I think we’re expected to run up mountains, bungee jump off cliffs, and announce to the men or women we’ve been pining over for years that “I AM IN LOVE WITH YOU and also I am dying.”  But if I were really going to die tomorrow (knock on wood), I would do none of those things.  I would just cry and then eat a lot of macaroni and cheese.

But even though today I’m not living like I’m dying by sending out a mass text that reads “luv u, plz make sure my cat is fed after im gone,” I do sound like I’m dying.  And sounding like I’m dying is kind of like living like I’m dying.  I have this very distinct, deep, gravelly, asthmatic-sea-lion cough, and I’ve had it on and off for years.  It’s pretty impossible to imagine just how awful this sounds, unless your brain can combine a dog’s bark with the sound of a broken garbage disposal.  If I had been born centuries ago, an infant with this hearty, diabolical cough, my villagers, fearing the spread of disease, would probably have abandoned me on some forsaken hillside, where kindly shepherd people would have found me and raised me as their own.  As I grew up, they would probably attempt to exorcise me, and if that didn’t work out, I probably would be screwed.  I’m glad I live in this century. 

But having my cough now ain’t no picnic, neither.  It’s uncomfortable for me when women at the mall lock eyes with me, gingerly reach for my hands, and tell me they’ll pray for me.  It’s offensive when self-righteous 14-year-old girls flip around to face me after a particularly asthmatic fit to gloat, “God, smoke much?!”  The only time my cough actually benefitted me was when a waiter brought me a free brownie, complemented me on my “deep vibrato cough,” and told me he hoped I’d get better soon.  I love brownies.  It was awesome. 

But here’s what I’ve discovered: People do not believe me when I tell them that there is nothing wrong me, and that I just was plopped on this earth sounding like a dying person.  Even though I am NOT dying, it makes people uncomfortable when I tell them I’m not; they think I’m lying to them, lying to myself, and generally living in denial of some obviously fatal condition.  Strangers expressing their sympathy would much rather I nod forlornly, thank them for their concern, and murmur something like, “Today is actually a good day… maybe tomorrow will be better,” or sigh, “Well… I’m a fighter,” with a wistful look in my eye that says, “Oh, to reach 30.”

If I actually start doing this, I realize I’ll be taking the phrase “live like you’re dying” more literally than, perhaps, Kris Allen and the duckling posters intended.  But the way I see it is, if I were to really live this day like it were my last, I’d be in a hospital on oxygen, screaming profanities and poetry verses in an attempt to leave my loved ones with something profound to remember me by.  At least I’m out of bed.  Because hey… I’m a fighter.