Final Acts

Bill is dying at the moment. Two years ago he watched Reg breathing his last in the traumatic funeral service that was supposed to be for someone else entirely, as the paramedics battled around him, and muttered, 'Let him go, let him go.' Now it's Bill's own turn. The last time I saw him in hospital, he could just about say my name and the phrase 'I go in and out', which cost him a lot of effort. A week later, lying in bed instead of sitting beside it, he couldn't say anything no matter how hard he tried. He looked dehydrated to me, his lips dry and flaky, but wouldn't or couldn't take any water from a straw, and happily a doctor came by so I was able to tell her: she would put him on some fluids, she said. The doctor gone, Bill's eyes mainly looked forward rather than at me. I assured him of the love of the parish and of God for him. And he started to cry out. I couldn't tell whether it meant laughter or distress. I have known the most faithful people, and Bill is nothing if not that, collapse into numbness or rage at the end, as though they never really believed it was going to happen to them. But whatever he felt, he couldn't communicate to me in any way I could understand. It was under the chain of inarticulacy.

There is nothing peaceful about this slow death. It's a battle, a concluding struggle to the end of a long life, as the body closes down. I suppose it's unreasonable to expect anything else, and we should brace ourselves for it: anything else is a bonus. But what a damnable business it is. In humanist terms, are there any earthly pleasures that can balance the terrible process of leaving them?

March 30th is also the 27th anniversary of the release of Dry and so I have listened to it again in line with my devotional programme. The unfocused rage behind it was helpful. 'Happy and Bleeding' is about a specifically female experience, but there was something applicable about some of the lyrics:

This fruit was bruised
dropped off and blue 
out of season ...
Long overdue
too early and it's late, too

If it were not for the Cross, for the divine sharing in the human sorrow, I would not be here doing this, I can tell you. Even with it, holding on to faith is a near thing.