Maudlin

I saw a dying man today.

I made it a point to attend a college at least four hours from home. I don't know why, really. It just seemed important. I opened a map of NY on my bed and circled every state school that was at least 200 miles from home.

I attended a school that was exactly 241 miles from home. It was one of the few goals I achieved in the four years between orientation and graduation.

I learned little in college. I learned that cliques transcend high school. I learned that liquor and beer, imbibed in any order, will make one sick. I learned that the person you knew as freshman was not necessarily the person you walked past with nary a glance as a senior. I learned that the theory of relativity applied to the human condition.

I saw a dying man today. I see this man maybe once or twice a month in the course of my work.

During college the thing I dreaded most about returning home for a holiday or vacation was the inevitable comments about how much weight I had gained or lost during the last visit home followed by the sharing of theories as to my current mass.

"We sent him too much money!" should I be deemed overweight.

"Look at him. Send him more money, dammit!" should I be deemed malnourished.

I saw a dying man today. I see him once or twice a month in the course of my work. He's been sick for some time, cancer from what I've been able to glean.

I would invariably retreat to a bathroom to inspect myself. Turning this way and that, I couldn't begin to see what the family saw. It was the same reflection as yesterday and it would be the same reflection I would see tomorrow. Crazy people. Though they all seemed to get a bit older, fatter or thinner each time I saw them...

I saw a dying man today. I see him once or twice a month in the course of my work. He's been sick for some time, cancer from what I've been able to glean. With each visit, he seems a bit more gaunt, a little slower, thinner, more tired.

It's a question of perspective. It's a question of being a boy in a train tossing a ball in the air as opposed to a boy at the station watching the train go by. Does the ball simply go up and down or does it bounce along as if it thrown. It's a question of perspective.

I saw a dying man today. I see him once or twice a month in the course of my work. He's been sick for some time, cancer from what I've been able to glean. With each visit, he seems a bit more gaunt, a little slower, thinner, more tired. He knows the reality of his situation, but I wonder, after seeing the pain I tried to conceal as I looked at him, if he went into the bathroom to ponder his reflection. I expect that, as he turned this way and that, he felt that he didn't seem all that different.

As rational beings, we all know our realities, but it occurred to me that our own perspective is a gift. It occurred to me that to be the boy on the train isn't about where you are going but where you are, where ignorance is bliss.