The probing and prodding of my body came at an early age. When I was six I was diagnosed with mitral valve prolapse. At first, they measured the length of my arms, assessing if I had Marfran Syndrome, which according to my mom would have been a death sentence. Instead, the diagnosis of MVP led to many trips to the children’s hospital in Indianapolis. Each trip meant doctors listening, looking, poking and touching.
My mortality was palpable during these sessions. Ryan White loomed over me as I walked down long stark hallways. A reminder that even the young can die.
The lingering reminder that we all die sooner or later has been my constant. From these visits to watching my grandma take her last breath. This is all very temporary has been my theme.
A few months ago as I was installing flooring in our home. I slammed the tip of my finger hard between the vinyl flooring and the rubber mallet. I cussed and hid the finger in the fist of my other hand and waited.
After several hours the tip had turned a deep purple. I watched it transform over the next few days from a living piece of me to a dead one. Then I had the realization that my whole body will look like this one day, all the life expelled, from deep purple to black and eventually nothing.
I’ve had these thoughts before – the decomposing flesh of this vessel that feels so immortal today. The rotting away of hands that held onto lovers, babies and wrote these words. My lips turning that same deep purple and then falling away. Of course, these thoughts are terrifying but also beautiful. I mean I’m so temporary and yet so here, so present. I think of the exquisite Colorado mountains and realize how their existence will outstretch mine by centuries upon centuries. In this perspective, the human body’s temporary beauty makes it the most rare of natural wonders.
This thought pattern has simultaneously blessed and cursed me. It’s created an obsession with appreciating my ever-changing body and a paranoia that every ailment could be the beginning to my end.
Today, I’m waiting on a biopsy for a mass near my tonsil. A biopsy to determine if it is malignant. I didn’t expect this, but who does. Since I was told that there were concerns it might be malignant – my ever-present awareness of my death has been rapidly cycling through my head.
At first, I was terrified and allowed myself to feel panic, fear, and all the things that come with the unknown and the waiting. The watching the deep purple turn into something else. Then over the course of many days, I began to realize that no matter the outcome I have no regrets. I don’t feel this desperate need to accomplish this or that. I don’t have an unfulfilled bucket list.
Of course, I don’t feel ready to leave either and I’m hoping for the best. My hope is this is a powerful reminder to realize the fleeting preciousness of each day. To look at the deep purple as the color that fills the sky when the sunrises on a new day.