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Hamlet and That Undiscovered Country.
Hamlet is such a wonderful play. Yes, we love Shakespeare, and had actually seen the play. We’d love to see it on Broadway, but I don’t know if that’ll ever happen.Anyway, I didn’t post anything yesterday because I wanted to finish working on chapter twenty to Dark Spirits, so I did that instead. And then this morning, I went over the first chapter to, Beyond the Eyes.
See. I told you I can’t sit on my hands. I’m a freak when it comes to perfecting my work or craft as some may call it. I keep thinking: I can make it better. I can make it better. Even though I’ve been told it’s good.
During lunch time, I was thinking about what I can write in my next post, and the only thing that came to me was Hamlet. I was thinking about this one part in Hamlet’s To Be or Not To Be speech that’s just awesome and so true. Here it is. . . .
To grunt and sweat under a weary life. But that the dread of something after death. The undiscovered country, from whose bourn. No traveler returns, puzzles the will. And makes us rather bear those ills we have. Than fly to others that we know not of. Thus, conscience does make cowards of us all.
That's so true. Even if Shakespeare didn’t actually write Hamlet (there has been some debate about that), he wrote other plays like Macbeth that was equally good, and has a lot of truth in it. But the point is what Hamlet was saying. We rather bear those ill wills we have because we’re afraid to go to that undiscovered country. Thus, conscience does makes cowards of us all. Wow. I know I’m a dork, but how he said it was awesome. And nobody really knows what happens to us when we die. Sure there are people who have had a NDE (near death experience), but we still don’t know if it’s true or not. I’ve read countless stories of NDEs because that stuff fascinates me. In fact, I’ve been reading about NDEs since I was like ten. My grandpa Charlie once told me that he had died of a heart attack, and found himself in a beautiful field full of colorful flowers. He said it was so peaceful, and he didn’t want to leave, so when the EMTs brought him back, he was so mad that he cussed them out. I have heard similar stories such as his, so have other people, but still we can’t say for sure that’s where we go when we die. Therefore, when death raps on our door, we’re scared of letting go and would rather hang onto misery than to release it. That is until we finally make peace with it, or it just takes us.
For years my mom had told me she was afraid of dying because she was afraid of going to hell. I told her numerous times that there was no such thing as brimstone and fire, and gave her a history lesson on it, and where the idea of hell came from. But still, she clung to that ideology crap that had been branded on her since birth. I think though, that she knew in her hearts of hearts the type of person she really was, all the things she had done to my sister and me, and so forth, and that was why she was afraid of going to hell. Just about every time we spoke, she’d bring it up. But the last time we spoke was different, this was how part of our conversation went . . .
Mom: "I’m dying."
Me: "Mom, you’ve been saying that for 15 years now."
Mom: (She lets out a short laugh) "I really am. I can feel it."
Me: "So, how do you feel about it?"
Mom: "I’m not scared anymore." (She half-whispers)
Me: "That’s good. You shouldn’t be. It’s supposed be an awesome place."
Mom: "Uh-huh."
Me: "Just think, you’ll get to be with your dad, and you can go fishing with him."
Mom: "Oooooh, that would be so wonderful. I miss my daddy."
Me: "I don’t want you to die though. I want you to be alive to see my book published."
She doesn’t respond, and I get nervous, so I start joking around to make light of the situation.
Me: "Don’t forget. You told me you’d let me know what it was like on the other side once you get there. But it has to be unequivocal, so I know my mind isn’t playing tricks on me. Just don’t appear in front of me at night, because I’ll get scared."
Mom: Laughs.
Me: "If you see Joe, tell him I miss and love him, and I’m going to kick his ass when I see him again."
Mom: Laughs. "I will."
I’m getting really nervous now, so I continue on, basically babbling, telling her stuff I want her to do.
Mom: Laughs. "I’m going to have to get a piece of paper and pen to write this list down."
Soon after, Mom has to go, and I tell her repeatedly that I love her. Because honestly, despite everything she had ever done to me, and that she never truly loved me or my sister, I still love her. Yeah, I’m still and probably will always be hurt and deeply sad that she had once told my sister she didn’t have to like us, but she had to love us because of God, and that she always thought about herself instead of us, and so on, and so on. But that’s okay because I have somebody who truly loves me for me, and I know I’m not defective like she had made me feel.
Sorry. I’m rambling. Back to the story. :)
Less than a week after that conversation, Mom died. This happened last April. The night that she died, I was on the computer looking up flights to Arizona, when all of a sudden a bright flash of light went through my computer room. It was so fast that the computer and light popped off, and then a second later it popped back on. Nothing else in the house went off, or in our neighborhood (I asked my neighbors about it the following day), so I wonder if that was Mom crossing over. I don’t know, but I haven’t heard from her.
So I think she’s just gone, to that undiscovered country.
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