Virtual Life

I'm sure it's somewhat of a cliche to muse about death in one's own blog. Further, I'm sure such thinking is remarkably more likely after being very ill and visiting the hospital. The difference with this post is that it's not really about my mortality. I haven't really though about my own mortality at all in light of my hospital trip. My illness did not make me confront death or evaluate my life or even draw up a will. I've been at peace with death for a long time and this wasn't a severe enough attack to make me contemplate dying any further.

It came to my attention today from talking to other people at school and at my place of employment that some people didn't receive the whole message about my condition. I had people telling me that they heard I had been confined to the hospital. One person said that he had been told that I was, and I quote, "mortally ill."

This sort of statement embarrasses me, somewhat! I certainly don't think that message was between the lines of the few letters I sent to various teachers and employees. I would wonder at people's imagination running away, except that it seemed to be coming from many sides. Would several unaffiliated individuals each decide that I was in the process of shuffling off this coil? It was a little surprising.

I missed one week of school. To most acqauintences, this translates to maybe two or three missed opportunities of seeing me. It's different for one group, I'm sure, because I missed an extra rehearsal and concert. That doesn't explain everyone else.

This didn't really bother my conscience until receiving an email last weekend about a Conservatory student who was killed in a car accident. A scholarship has been established in his name and the funeral and visitation are coming up. He's not an acquaintance of mine; as far as I know, I never saw or spoke to him.

Today, on a whim, I visited his Facebook page. I wasn't sure whether or not he'd even have one, but I figured it was a fair assumption, based on his age. He does have a page, which has (in the intervening period after his death) been transformed into a memorial.

Friends have left many postings on his wall addressed to him, telling stories or explaining their grief. His picture has been replaced with one stenciled with his birth and death dates and a farewell message. Comments on individual photos speak to him in a way people don't talk to the living: they praise him for his friendship, they laud his patience, they extol the best of all his qualities.

Were such declarations made during his lifetime, in such a way? I doubt it. The wall from before his death is filled with posts about parties and girls and bad teachers. I feel that it is a tragedy that his friends may never have praised him to his face.

In reality, it is the cessation of life that forces us to evaluate people. The dead have lost the ability to alter how the world perceives them. While living, the greatest saint can rob a bank or the lowliest guttersnipe save a child. Dead, they become fixed. They have been. They are no longer. At someone's death, we unconsciously sum them up and set the memories neatly on a shelf under their own label.

Obviously, it would be strange to be perennially telling people how wonderful they are. We reserve that for communication between idealistic people while they're dating. We register the deeds of people in passing, almost without comment. There's Rick; he opens the door for everyone because that's what he always does. There's Elaine; she always listens when I complain about heavy workloads.

Each of us is assisted through our days by the thoughtless kindnesses. We are enveloped in the effortless decency. Every day, the people around us do a hundred things that would be worthy of being eulogized.

And how many are thanked while it still matters? It's a fine thing to lionize people after they die, but who is it for? Other people will nod and agree at the passing of a great person, and the survivors who make the praise may be fired by the passing spirit. The object of affection is lost, however. Let's set aside the afterlife, since no one knows the extent of the connection. The chance to praise the one who should be praised is lost.

Who reads a Facebook post on a dead man's wall? The family? Perhaps. Friends? For a while, anyway. The deceased? Let's hope not; after all, it will be a crying shame if the only way to get information in the beyond is by reading the internet. Shouldn't a spirit know the minds of his friends?

So we come to C.S. Lewis, who famously wrote that by praying, he wasn't expecting to change God's mind. He was praying for himself; that the prayer changed something inside of himself. Just like the wall post: we write it not because we expect God to see it, or even that we expect the dead to see it. We write it because we need to see it written. It's not enough to think it in our own heads, when writing it down can make it real and concrete.

Has it always been the case that we need to tell everyone "Here hath been a great man" only after the final moments? Or is it easier to let our emotions go and be jubilant with our praise after the person is gone? When someone like Heath Ledger dies, then comes the accolades. Then comes the testimonials. Then comes the swell of public acclamation.

Finally, I'll leave you with a situation in which technology has leapfrogged our emotions. Since his death, parts of the man's Facbook account remain frozen. His status update from Saturday evening still praises the Kansas basketball team. But the account is not idle. Since his death, he's made several more friends connections, written on people's walls, and even plans to attend the event of his own funeral.

The digitally-animated doppelganger disgusts me. I realize it's just family members making connections and organizing memorial services, but to see this digital zombie going through the regular motions that hundreds of thousands of other Facebook accounts go through on a daily basis seems demeaning to me.