Death Will Come

When was the last time you seriously thought about dying? I do not mean that of suicidal tendencies. No, I talk here about death in the least romantic of terms. Death through normal means, road accident, robbery gone wrong, falling and knocking your head, killer litter.

What were the chances that you would be living today? How old are you now? 15? 25? 35? Maybe 75? The older you are, the higher the chance that you should be dead, but aren’t.

You know any one around your age who has died? I do. Road accident. Crashed his motorcycle. He was 22.

Before him, I knew this other guy who died from a heart attack. His sibling tried waking him up for school. Shook him up. Didn’t know he had a disease that caused his heart to be unstable; the resulting shock of the shake killed him. He was 12.

I hardly consider the possibility of death through such events. Suicide, yes. But then, those thoughts were highly romanticised — in a suicidal state of mind, death doesn’t feel like death.

Let’s look at the theory of parallel universes. For every event that has multiple outcomes, the universe “branches” out into different worlds.

I cross the street, and a car zooms past by me. Bam! The universe splits into different worlds.

In one world, I am here, typing this.

In the other, I am dust.