"Kick the Bucket"

“Kick the bucket”, of course, is the American idiom for the noun death or the verb to die. Whatever its origins are, I suppose Americans, like us Filipinos, would rather euphemize death in order to hide its morbid or forbidden nature.

But should that be the case? Is there really no joyful side to dying, no upside to being down due to impending death? For us Christians, has not death already lost its sting according to St. Paul? Has not Christ already conquered death?

All these questions come to mind when I watched a movie recently entitled (what else?) The Bucket List. The movie is about an African-American blue-collar mechanic Carter Chambers (Morgan Freeman) and a Caucasian billionaire hospital magnate Edward Cole (Jack Nicholson) who meet for the first time in Cole’s hospital after both have been diagnosed with cancer. They become friends as they undergo their respective treatments. Both are diagnosed with a year or less to live. Carter begins writing a "bucket list," or things to do before "he kicks the bucket." Cole discovers the list and pushes Carter for them to do the list and promises to pay for everything. Carter agrees after a brief argument between the two.

From then on the movie becomes an unusual story of two men “living their dying” with joy as they accomplish their “bucket list” one after the other. The two eventually forge a deep friendship and come to realizations on the true meaning of their lives and on what they mean to their loved ones. In the end, death becomes more of a friend than an enemy and the grave a true resting place symbolized by empty coffee cans of Chock Full O’nuts atop Mt. Everest.

And speaking of death, I have been extra-conscious of my own mortality for some time now. You see, my own father passed away at the early age of 61 and ever since I hit age 61 some years back, I have considered every year as a bonus year for me. This conscious awareness deepened when I had a close encounter with death from a heart attack and when I came face-to-face with terminal cancer and near-death patients at the hospital during my CPE (Clinical Pastoral Education) training last year. My interest in caring for the dying and learning from them as well as from books and movies about dying has also intensified as a consequence.

Thus, I started my self-education on death and dying with Elizabeth Kubler-Ross’ On Death and Dying. This is the classic book by one of the most eminent writers on the subject of death and dying. It goes through what the dying have to say to doctors, nurses, clergy and their own families which makes it very interesting. Other than the introductory chapters on the stages of Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance, the book is devoted to interviews given by severely ill and dying patients to a class of medical and pastoral care professionals and those studying to fill these roles.

The author’s main point is to enable us to accompany the dying in such a way that both dying and living are enriched by enhanced human intimacy. Kubler-Ross teaches us how to understand the death of a family member or loved one and how to cherish the final moments with them. She also inspires us to learn how to care for and understand the dying patients and their family members. She assists the reader how to render care and compassion by depicting true-to-life experiences of those who are dying. Overall, the book grabs at your heart and pulls you in!

While in Honolulu, I also got interested in the works of Professor Mitsuo Aoki, founder of University of Hawaii’s Department of Religion. For several decades he has shown others how to consider death not merely as an end but as a vital and inseparable part of living joyfully. He shows this graphically in a documentary video he entitled “Living your Dying” (a copy of which I am a proud owner now). He also brought spirituality and forgiveness into the caregiving for the dying. His approach takes one to a state of “conscious dying” that leads to fuller, and even joyful, living (www.livingyourdying.com).

Last year also, I bought and read a book (Chasing Daylight by Gene O’Kelly). Mr.O'Kelly's moving account of his own life and death will give everyone who reads it some profound issues to consider. Within a year, his life from being a powerful CEO of a huge American company turned 360 degrees to the life of a doomed but “blessed” (his own word) man. The book is a wonderful, lucid account of his last three month making plans on what to do with his life. He trained himself to live in the present, to find those perfect moments that crystallize the beauty of life, and to say his farewells to his friends, family and loved ones. In following his plan, and to his surprise, he attained what he has been after all along: peace. Like Mitsuo’s message, the lesson of the book is clearly that death is a part of, not the end of, life; and that we can live our dying with joy. This is a beautiful little book that can stand side by side with the other classics on death and dying such as Mitch Albom’s Tuesdays With Morrie.

Come to think of it, the verb to die, is an active verb and therefore it is not just a passive event for which we just have to wait to happen in our life. In the end, however, no matter what we call or how we euphemize it, death is a reality we must face now no matter our age or status in life.

By the way, today they are cremating the remains of our beloved Tito Nestor Urrutia, husband of Thelma’s most-loved Tita Nor (youngest and only sister of Thelma’s Dad). Thelma and I saw him in his last days truly “living his dying”… Farewell, Tito Nestor! Your living as well as your dying have been an inspiration to us!