Wouldn't it be remarkable to have spent your entire life in anonymity where no one ever knew your name publicly until you've passed on. Then, upon your passing anyone who drives by the funeral home sees your name there in flashing ten-inch tall letters. For a brief moment, drivers would read your name and wonder about you, who you were, what accomplishments you made in your lifetime, did you have friends, family, were you loved, what you did while you were here. Then, as quickly as your name faded in a blink of electricity the drivers musings would turn to their own safety, their own lives, loves, happinesses, and heartaches. As the last spark of electricity faded from the bulbs that illumined your notoriety for that moment, suddenly you'd be forgotten by people who never knew you.
In this life we're given a few chances to make good on living, much of it happens in fits and starts after a fashion. Though, eventually many of us get something going for ourselves that puts food in our bellies, a roof over our heads, a companion that gives us joy, and maybe some affiliations that provide a modicum of identidy to our meager turnings. Yet, what of those multitudes out there who are living this life in complete anonymity. Those millions of unknowns who if only a moment flash onto our radar and then, disappear
2 comments:
In the south, we still pull to the side of the road and stop when meeting a funeral procession....not everyone, but those of us old enough to recalll the custom of reflecting upon and respecting the passage of a life from this world.
"All mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated...As therefore the bell that rings to a sermon, calls not upon the preacher only, but upon the congregation to come: so this bell calls us all: but how much more me, who am brought so near the door by this sickness....No man is an island, entire of itself...any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee."
John Donne, Mediation 17
I think that every time i happen to pick up the paper and scan the pages.... inevitablely come to the obits.. and think... how can someones life truely be defined by one or two paragraphs?
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