Lost & Found

One of my blogger friends called today to tell me that her ex has lost his mother.

I curbed my first instinct to ask her, 'where?'.

Years of married life has taught me to be polite and the art of pretending to care.

After going on for sometime about the suffering of the poor woman, she consoled herself by telling me that she must be in a better place ( Not my blogger friend,who is still alive, so she must have been referring to the 'lost' woman).

I have a problem when people tell me things with certainty about things they possibly can have no clue about.

Better place?

Let us go with the popular assumption that we are all some sort of energy expressing our self. In which case the body is the vessel through which we choose to do this expression.

With me so far?

Since the body to a large part is a sensory device, this world we see around us then must be perceived through the functions of our senses. More or less. So it stands to reason that when we die; if this energy actually exists and this energy is what you and I really are; then devoid of the body everything around us will cease to exist because we cannot perceive it anymore. Its not that it does not exist but it just cannot be perceived anymore. This should be death. Right?

Actually it cant be that simple. But it sounds nice because it ties everything up very nicely. Problem is , will we be able to perceive us as our self? Possibly not. Without a reference point, which the duality of body and soul concept conveniently provides, I cannot point to one and say this one is me. Therein , my friends lies the paradox of death. For all practical purpose, it seems that with death, you and I cease to exist.

Better place? I have no idea. I cant even my bend my mind around the concept of a world without perception. You try it.

My friend thinks Iam cold. Iam not.

She thinks Iam morbid. Iam not.

She feels the dead should be respected because life is sacred and a person's death leaves a void. That effect of a person's life on another should be respected.

You think? I have no idea.

I dont know this person. Neither does my friend.Atleast not intimately. Any void she must feel is probably self induced. In this virtual voyeuristic world, where one can be kind to a nation by swiping a card, its probably self satisfying to assume that we care because we can shed tears in front of the TV screen.

We care.

Iam not belittling anything. Emotions are emotions. But lets be realistic. I certainly didn't lose my sleep when a plane went down and 96 people died.Some one's parent, husband, wife, brother, son, daughter..what have you. The only void they must have left is in the thoughts and life of those whose life was intertwined with theirs intensely. That void too will fill up.Eventually. The dead are carried only by the living. Like Siva carrying the body of Uma until the rotten carcass fell piece by piece on earth. Dead do not leave any void. The void is in the living.

As for respect. The dead don't seem to care too much for it.

So my question, my friend, still remains :

Where did your ex lose his mother?