Ghosts

The clanking and wretched ringing of a bell echoes the vacant, sleeping hallways of the hospital, "Death! Death is coming! Death is here!" I exclaimed while stumbling down the hallway mid delusion. The hallucinations were taking hold, tightening their grip. I had to warn the others. Warn them on the impending doom of their mortality; tell them that their stories have an inevitable ending.

    The nurses tried to entice me to take the pills; their only remedy that I must say is rather archaic. I would imagine by now we would have something faster-acting, something that is a little more innovative. Another reason I was trying to find a way out. I felt split from true time. The time frame I felt I should have been born in and the one I was actually experiencing.

    I saw that in my tirade that I clearly got the other patients' attention and their excitement for it caused havoc throughout the ward. One of the depressives were crying here eyes out, a schizophrenic lady was trying to catch some imaginary bubbles, one of the patients that was there had severe anger issues and was yelling at the top of his lungs for the bell to stop. The nurses finally sedated me from a sneak attack with a needle. The lights were out.

    There are usually four ideas that we convince ourselves about death to comfort the fear of our finite duration. The first idea being that we are going to regain our youth, a wondrous elixir that will turn back the clock so we can live a longer life. Which doesn't seem logically plausible, but then again anything is possible with the development in cryogenics, stem cell research, genetic engineering, and nanotechnology, why not?

    Second being one of Lazarus proportions, the resurrection. It accepts that we will once die, but somehow/someway we will live on again. We will rise from the dead once the end of it all occurs. That can seem like the start of a zombie movie though. With that there is a third; others then tell themselves that our bodies are too high of maintenance so they go with the idea that when we die we will depart our body and live on forever as a non corporeal essence, a soul. A ghost of a theory, but most people in today's culture believes that there is a soul or some form of equivalent that bears today's vocabulary. The hope that maybe we can sustain the bandwidth to upload our memories or consciousness into a computer in the hopes we can live on as an avatar or simulation.

    Lastly, there is our legacy, the belief that we will live on in the wake that we leave behind in the waters. In the Digital Age that we are a part of this one doesn't seem too far off; however, trying to achieve that everlasting fame in the archives of Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and the like seems steep considering the number of others you are competing against for it. Some leave a legacy in their children though, in hopes that their offspring will carry their proverbial torch whilst carrying their personal ones all for the sake and fear of the end. "Death is not an event in life: We do not live to experience death. And so, in this sense, life has no end." -Ludwig Wittgenstein.

    The light was slowly flooding in as my eyes creaked open with that feeling that they were glued shut. "Are you okay?" said my roommate as he stood creepily above me. He startled me and I rolled off the bed taking the blanket with me. "Yes, I think I am. What are you thinking scaring me like that?" I said as I gathered my blanket and regained my balance and stood up.

    "I was only trying to see if you were alive?" my roommate asked as he grabbed his blanket to wrap himself in. It was insanely cold throughout the hospital.   

    "I'm fine now. What happened? How long was I out?" I asked with a slight nervousness. In my tirades there is no telling what I have done or said, it can be very upsetting for some about what I say in those episodes. I can't count on all the hands and toes I was given the amount of friends I have lost in those outbursts. "You were wrapped in a blanket walking down the halls carrying the big bell the nurse uses for lunch time. You were going on about death and all that; most of the others woke up and were in a fit too. It was quite the fiasco. Come on, we have to go to breakfast." My roommate added as we left.