Exit This Way

by Kyle Wiseley

One morning this week my cell phone woke me with a sound it had never made before – just a short melodic trill, then silence. In checking, I found that the battery was completely drained, the phone completely dead. I had never let it get that low before and for some reason it triggered my sometimes evil sense of humor. I assume that others sometimes ponder their own demise and what the circumstances might be around that event. Once in a while my own whimsy takes me to that inevitable scenario and I wonder how it will be. I suppose any accident that would simulate the splat of a bug on a windshield wouldn’t be bad except for the final micro-second which would be unpleasant but mercifully brief. Although passing in one’s sleep seems easy, it also seems like the coward’s way out. I think I would miss the details of the transition. Of course elements of violence and terror and enormous pain are to be understandably dreaded, but I don’t think I’d mind if I lingered a bit. I wouldn’t want people fussing over me. Perhaps just be lying peacefully in bed with as little pain and as much sharpness of consciousness as possible, with my faithful dog curled up beside me and just be able to observe the event from within, as it were.

There is an organization that will provide a harp and player to accompany one’s passing. Now I don’t particularly mind harp music and I think it was used to outstanding effect in the musical “Les Miserables”, but at my deathbed I think I would find it ludicrous and intrusive. One of my favorite cartoons was two panels: in the first was St. Peter greeting newcomers at the Pearly Gates with a hearty, “Welcome to Heaven! Here is your harp.” The second panel pictured Satan ushering newcomers through the gates of hell with the words “Welcome to hell! Here’s your accordion.”

Although I hold little affection for accordion music, the image of shuffling off this mortal coil to the rousing sounds of “Lady of Spain” has more than a small appeal.

I hope you aren’t offended by a light-hearted look at end of life scenarios. Such an attitude is possible and appropriate because of the Easter Season which we are celebrating. The agony and terror of Good Friday and the sealed tomb was not the end of the story, but there was great joy and celebration because Jesus did reappear and the concept of resurrection and eternal life became real.

So without fear or dread I hope I can make my final exit with the melodic tinkle of mirth on my lips and perhaps the rousing strains of “Lady of Spain” in the background.