Thursday, December 23, 2004

Day Two: "Ghengis Khan died of a nosebleed."

Day Two.

Ten thousand days.

That’s twenty seven point three nine seven two six zero years recurring, or about twenty seven years and four months (approximately).

It’s how long I have left to live.

Maybe.

If I’m lucky.

That takes me to the grand old age of eighty.

That’s not too much to ask, is it?

Really it’s a totally arbitrary figure. I might live till I’m a hundred. Then again, I might be dead next week. Who knows?

I could be hit by a bus or a car. I could fall off a ladder. I could trip over a misplaced man-hole cover and hurtle headlong down the exposed hole. I could be struck by lightning. I could be fried in an industrial accident while unintentionally passing by the factory, having got lost in some city somewhere, and taking a wrong turning.

This would be a particularly ironic death, as I have managed to avoid working in factories these last thirty years.

Once upon a time it would have been considered my destiny to end up working in a factory, thus lessening the odds of me dying in this particular way.

Shall I go on?

Genghis Khan died of a nosebleed.

Aristotle died when a passing eagle mistook his bald head for a rock, and dropped a turtle on it to break its shell.

Those last two facts are as approximate as everything else in this text as I can’t say for certain whether either of them are actually true.

It only goes to show how bizarre are the possibilities of death.

Myself, I am most likely to die of the cumulative effects of alcohol and tobacco, these being my particular weaknesses.

I would like to invent a romantic death for myself, but I can’t.

Let’s just say I will die, at some point, and in some way.

I only hope it will be relatively painless.

*******

1 comment:

Chandira said...

Robert's grandmother died when a doctor was checking her out to diagnose a problem. He declared her well and fit for a few more years, not finding anything wrong, then did one last test. He stuck his finger up her butt, and she just upped and left her body from the shock of it!
Or, you could die on the toilet like my friend Kate's grandfather in high school...