Death Came Knocking

I found death waiting on my doorstep the other night. I opened the door much to Deaths surprise and invited him in. He followed me, though quite unaccustomed to being summoned and seemed curious at the same time. I beckoned him to the kitchen table and we both sat.

I looked Death in the eye that night and even talked to him. I decided since Death would inevitably come knocking that I wanted him to understand the kind of person I was. After all, Death only knew death, that after-parting of life.

He looked at me, I looked at him. I cleared my throat and began to explain my life. He stopped me and showed that he knew of my life and all the things in it. I noticed something missing while he showed my life to me. It was all in black and white, so clear and cut, hard and a tear welled up in my eye. Death seemed transfixed as if my life hung in a balanced state at that very moment. Understanding overcame me. Death had no feeling, his was a job that required only his obedience. Sadness filled up inside my very being, how selfish I had been to think I could explain my very existence.

Death looked at me and through me, waiting as he had been since the day of my birth. Death was never far away, still in the background, in the shadows, waiting. He had been there at my side, throughout my life, waiting during my first car accident, waiting at the corner when I stepped off the curb, still waiting at my front door. Each time it seemed as if I had beckoned Death, then pulled back, cheating him of his cause. Yet there was something else, something that I felt that I needed to show him. Feeling, it was the feelings he missed out on, the reason he entered that night without taking and I began to color my life in vivid reds, hues of oranges, brilliant yellows, blues, greens, and all those millions of colors that lay between. He just nodded, and if he smiled I do not know, for one does not look directly into Death's face twice. I now understood his visit, yes his visit, not my request as I had first thought when I opened my door. Life is to be lived, vividly, colorfully, and lovingly, enjoy what you can, for Death will come soon enough for you, whether you open the door or not.