xtravagantworshipper

April 18, 2006

I realise why I didn’t end up as a doctor. I also realise God kept me from being a doctor.

Nope, it’s not because I cannot handle blood. Nope, it’s not because I can’t steady my hands properly, so I would have been useless as a surgeon.

It’s because I realised that I don’t deal with death very well.

Last year, in 2005, I witnessed the passing on of a few people I know. Not that they are particularly close to me.

Two had been my neighbours, the other two were parents of two leaders in church.

The first funeral I attended last year – the guy was the elder brother of a pair of twins I knew since primary school. They stay on the twelfth floor, I stay on the eighth floor. Hence we have struck up a friendship over meeting one another in the lift.

He was a full-time Christian worker, a brother well-loved by God and a man of God himself. I don’t really know him that well as opposed to his younger brother.

But we do greet and exchange small talk when we meet. He passed away after he lost the fight against leukaemia. He was 27.

When I saw him lying there in the coffin, I struggled to hold back my tears. He looked completely different from the face I was familiar with – I couldn’t even recognise him. His face was grey and shrivelled, like a withered prune - a pale shadow of his former self. And he looked in pain, even in that rested state.

I couldn’t believe he died. I had a strange feeling when I returned home from work one night. I saw literally hundreds of youths at this funeral in the neighbouring block.

Strangely, I had a weird feeling.

The rumours of his passing on had reached my ears from this annoyingly kay-poh neighbour who lived next door to me. She had told my mum that one of the twins on the twelfth floor had passed away.

I refused to believe it - until one morning when I just left my house for work. I left my jacket behind and went back home to get it.

And that was when I ran into this brother’s mum at the lift landing. She told me the news herself and invited me to ‘see’ him for the last time.

The funeral was held in the neighbouring block because there was another one in our block too. She also told me hundreds of youths attended his funeral the previous night. The night when I had a strange feeling after coming home from work.

Those youths, she explained, were his sheep – they loved this shepherd, this brother who was both a teacher and a friend to them. And they came to pay their last respects.

I cracked at work several times that day. It’s weird. Well, because in the first place, I wasn’t that close to him.

But you could imagine how devastating it must have been for a mother to cremate her own child.

It’s coming to a year since her son had passed on. Nowadays I still run into his mum in the lift sometimes when she takes her dog out for a walk. And you can tell from her eyes that the sadness never left.

She’s still in grief. Quietly.

After attending two more funerals – both were parents of church leaders who are dear to me – I knew why I cracked. I don’t deal with death well.

The other neighbour who passed away stayed on my floor too – a loving father to a family of four and a wife who had a stroke a few years ago and was mostly paralysed since then. He had been taking care of her for the last few years. So his death came as a surprise to me. Because he’s supposed to be the healthy one.

Since then, I think the fear gripped me like a stranglehold. It seemed less on some days but whenever I watch TV shows like Grey’s Anatomy or even Lost, I remembered breaking down on a few occasions.

Okay, maybe I’m a sobby person. I think it’s quite a wimp for a guy to be that sobby. Maybe I inherited these genes from my mum.

In any case, I get affected by scenes of death very easily. I realised deep down, I was very fearful that I’m going to face what both my church leaders had faced and this two families have faced – dealing with the passing on of their loved ones.

I don’t know how I can do that. I remembered this story that a dear sister from choir forwarded to me in an email. It spoke of a story in which this man decided to date his mother for a change upon his wife’s request. His mum was all excited and got dressed up for the occasion, in all her jewels and pearls and finest fabric. She was going to have a date with her beloved son.

They went to this diner which brought back fond memories of the son’s childhood. This was the diner to which his mum would bring him as a kid for meals on special occasions like Christmas Eve or to celebrate his birthdays.

His mum enjoyed the date. Little did the son know that this was to be their last dinner together at that diner. She passed on one week after their date.

A few months later, the son was back at the diner with his wife. And the waiter at that diner, who recognised the boy, passed him a note.

It was from his mum. It read: “Dear Charles, I enjoyed our date so much. Thank you for the meal. I had a great time. Now I know I might not have the chance to have dinner here with you again. So I’ve paid for this meal. Have a great time with Danielle. I love you son.”

The son broke down after reading the note.

I broke down too after reading her email. I don’t want to lose my parents. I don’t want to deal with the loss of loved ones. But I also learnt that hey, it’s really time we should shower our loved ones and cherish them while they are still alive. No use shedding tears and bemoaning all the “What-ifs” after they passed on.

I was struck with a terrible illness a couple of weeks ago. It was a serious bout of flu and took me two weeks to recover. During those two weeks, I had to take MC from work for several days, and I felt so weak and vegetative.

I know it might be a bit exaggerating but at times, the fever would hit me and I felt my whole head was going to explode.

1st April was April Fools’ Day. I wasn’t very much amused myself. That night, the fever broke again, and it was terrible. I felt energy sapping and drifting away from me. It felt almost like dying. I couldn’t sleep and just lay there on my bed with tears quietly rolling down my cheeks.

Eventually I gave up and woke my mum up at around 6 a.m. in the morning (I had been up the whole night) to take me to a hospital.

I was given injections for blood samples to be analysed for possibility of dengue fever. Then I was sent home.

I got better the next day though I still felt weak. But thoughts were racing through my mind. That fear gripped me again.

My mum was going to leave home to help out my dad in his fruit shop in the afternoon when I called out her name.

And I just had to tell her. I held her hand in mine, and I spoke my mind – everything that was going through my heart and mind for the past couple of days.

I told her about my fear, that whenever she gets mad or upset and say things like “It’s better that I die…rather than to suffer like this…”, I feel a knot in my throat. I begged her and made her promise not to say things like that again.

I told her I loved her – very very much. I think it freaked her out. Because I was saying things that a dying person will say to his or her loved ones at their last breath. She kept asking me what was going on.

As I related all those words in my heart to her, I broke down again. And she cried too. But I wanted to tell her I loved her. Now if you’re not familiar with Asian culture, we don’t say things like these much. Because Asian parents show their love in very subtle ways. They don’t say words like: “I love you.” They don’t kiss you, they don’t hug you. The closest you will get is my mum touching my face and assuring me that everything is going to be fine.

So this revelation to her gripped her with fear. She might have thought I was going away…

But I want to let her know all these. Tell her I love her very much. I don’t want to look back on my life with regrets. Or to say “oh, if only she were alive, I would have spent time with her more” or think about all the loving words you can say to her.

I want her to hear it. And I’m glad I did that. I’m glad I poured out my heart to her.

Perhaps that fear still lingers, but I’m praying more often than I used to when I was younger – you know, when you’re in your adolescence and early twenties, you prefer to spend time hanging out with friends. You despise the idea of being seen with your parents even.

I’m praying that the Lord will bring salvation to my entire family. Because I don’t want to part with her. I want to see them in Heaven. I plead the blood of Jesus on them and I prayed for their protection going in or coming out.

Yes, that fear remains, and sometimes, it overpowers me so much. But I’m praying, and I want to use whatever that remains of my time on earth (before we get raptured or we passed on), to shower them with love.

Start cherishing the time you have with your loved ones today.

It’s never too late. It’s always good to be early.

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