Dying Slowly in America

Arguably, one of the greatest pieces of health-care literature to come out of the 1990s was the screenplay for Mission Impossible. In a charming scene at a Czech restaurant Director Eugene Kittridge remarks, “dying slowly in America after all, can be a very expensive proposition Ethan. So, why don’t we go quietly out of here onto the plane…”

Even though I am young yet I have seen the truth of these words in my own life. I have been dying for the past 25 years and it has cost my parents and me an incredible amount of money. So much so that a few years back they decided that I had been dying long enough on their dime and it was time for me to finance my own death.

This was fine because I had just finished college and there were plenty of businesses willing to pay me to die a little each day in their cubicles. It was an interesting change to be paid to die at a desk as compared to college where I paid to die at a desk.

It’s funny to watch how people spend their money on houses, cars, and children; trying to make their last few decades just a little more comfortable. It’s funny because these things won’t last. The houses will be moved to the coast and knocked over by hurricanes, the cars will be recalled by GM or hit by a sixteen year old driving their parent’s car, and the kids will die when they’re sixteen after hitting somebody’s car.

The Egyptians are the only ones who ever really figured out how to defeat death. You build enormous tombs that are immune to hurricanes, recalls, and teenagers. Your whole life and the lives of your loved ones are dedicated to creating legacies sturdy enough to give time a run for its money.

Grave robbers and Lara Croft can come and steal your bones and treasures but that’s not what’s important. What they can never steal is your enormous pyramid, it’s too big.

Some people have tried to create other kinds of legacies, but anything that is not a simple shape built of invincible stone will ultimately fall into ruin. Shakespeare thought that incredible poetry and prose could grant immortality because it would be passed along through the generations.

Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,(he couldn’t spell “wander”)
When in enternal lines to time thou grow’st, (or “grow”)
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee

But even now his works are regarded as a heavy chore by today’s students and only embraced by the geekiest of the generations. Soon enough Shakespeare will be replaced by the next flash in the pan playwright and Kenneth Branagh can make movies from the new plays.

I realize that there is not enough room on earth for all of us deserving individuals to have mighty pyramids. Luckily, there are enough planets out there with no life; almost as if they were waiting for us to build our grand tombs there and give their barren existence a purpose. You start with the moon and move out, and when this globe has grown too warm or too nuclear bombed and all life has ceased the monuments to our greatness will still stand proudly throughout the universe.