I was reminded to think about how I’d like to die. It’s actually pretty simple: a long, slow, painless death, greatly deferred. I’ve actually got it thoroughly planned out.
I’m on my deathbed in my undersea dome, surrounded by my children, my grandchildren, my great grandchildren, my great-great grandchildren, and my great-great-great grandchildren (it’s a very large dome). I’m looking good — I’ve lost some weight, the rejuvenation treatments have been working well, and I’m also feeling terrific — but I know my expiration is imminent. I get ready to speak my last words.
“I love you, Mary.” The phone rings.
“Yes, this is he,” I say. I whisper to Mary, “It’s the Nobel committee.” “Yes, thank you, it’s an honor. You’re lucky to have called just now — another 10 minutes, and I would have been posthumous, and no longer qualify. We have a spot all picked out on the wall for it, right next to all the Olympic gold medals. But now I have to get back to dying. Later!”
“My children, my descendants, I’m very proud of you all,” I continue. The phone rings again.
“Hello, Madam President. Don’t worry, stop crying, you have nothing to worry about — I trained you well, you don’t need me any more. Also, my wife has agreed to step in as an advisor, and you know she’s the smart one of the family. Besides, with world peace and prosperity a reality, it’s not as if you need my guidance anymore. Bye!”
I turn off the ringer on the phone, and settle in for a quiet exit. “Now where was I…”
The door bursts open! There, standing in all of his regalia, is the Last Priest in the World!
“I could not miss this opportunity for a deathbed conversion,” he hisses, swinging his censer and and shaking his staff, resplendent in his bright orange robes and mitre (as the last priest, he was also the Pope, the Dalai Lama, the Head Imam, etc. — religion had tried a desperate series of mergers to stem the rising tide of atheism.) Then his words are lost in a welter of glossolalia and Latin.
I leap from my deathbed, and gripping his throat in my left hand, I lift him off the floor; with my right, I deliver a stinging series of slaps. “There <SLAP!> is <SLAP!> no <SLAP!> god! <SLAP!>” I throw him to the floor.
He shakes, as if waking from a dream. “You’re right,” he says, “I’ve been living a lie. I don’t know how I deluded myself for so long.” He throws off his mitre, his yamulke, his robes, his staff, his orb, multiple fragments of old saints’ corpses, his magic underwear, and rises naked, unashamed of his humanity. “I think I’ll go back to school and learn something useful. Do you have any recommendations?”
“Biology is always good,” I say as I vault back into my deathbed.
“Now where was I…oh, yes, my last words.” And I say them, and they are witty and wise and will be quoted down the centuries, but I can’t tell you what they are, because they’re also totally spontaneous, so you’ll just have to wait.
And then, with a soft quiet sigh, I die instantly and painlessly.
At least, that’s how I’m planning to die. Reality may interfere. But you know what isn’t anywhere in my scenario?
Cancer.
