It's Pretty Funny, When You Think About It

 

Sure you’re crazy, I tell myself, but who isn’t? I mean, look at the terms: You’re born, you’re the center of attention, everyone makes a big fuss, takes care of your every need. You eat, sleep, grow, get excited about things, like the snow and the circus coming and Halloween. Life is great. In fact, you struggle against sleep each night because it’s so much fun just being awake. 

 

Then one day-- one second--you don’t know (although I can’t remember not knowing, there must have been a time) and the next one you do: Everything ends! The whole shebang! And not just for yourself, but for everyone you know. So you say, Okay, I can handle it, just tell me when. And they say, The funny thing is, nobody knows, it could be any day now. Of course, some people have been known to last a hundred years or more. 

 

You go on, but it’s not the same, and life becomes the daily sweepstakes: Gee, I wonder who died today? Hey, here’s a list in the newspaper, these people think of everything. There’s even something called life insurance for after you go, except then it’s too late to do you any good. It’s enough to make anyone crazy. So they started having doctors for this sort of thing, this Awareness of Truth Syndrome that could cut you down in your prime. Psychiatrists, psychologists, witch doctors, priests, call them what you will, it all boils down to the same thing: Here’s my life, Doc, what should I do with it? And what if I die before I do anything at all? 

 

The only trouble is, Doc doesn’t know the answers any more than you do. He’s got the same terms, you see, there is no other plan available. There is only Plan A: Birth, Life, and Death, details varied and unspecified. So really, the shrinks just act like they know. But what a performance, people even pay to see it.