In The Event of My Passing…

I don’t remember what happiness feels like. I really don’t. I really feel like this is all the range of emotions that I have ever felt – loneliness, emptiness, every day anticlimax, haunting desolation, ghostly silence, gloom. It’s all so dark; and depressing, I know. But I know it’s not true. At least I believe that it’s not.

Last Thursdayism is the theory that all of life and the known Universe was created last thursday; including all of our memories about time before last thursday, and including all of our sciences. It sounds made up, I know; like some crazy non-scientific person made it up. Almost like all faiths. But there’s really no way to disprove it. There is no way to, absolutely and unequivocally, prove that it is made up. The only way it’s true (to you), like most things, is if you believe it.

So, I don’t know if I have ever been happy. I can’t ever know. Ever since the universe was created last thursday, I have only ever known different variations of non-happiness. And all the made up memories? Mostly non-happiness. The Universe and its creators are generally unkind; I think. I have a memory of being 11 years old and knowing, truly, the feeling of happiness. But it’s all made up. If it happened before last thursday, it’s not real. Take my word for it.

You know, if it wasn’t for the existential terror of staring into the literal void of space, i’d say, i’m feeling a little better today.

Tony Stark (Avengers: Endgame, 2019)

So, naturally, I’ve been thinking about dying a lot; a different kind of experience from non-happiness. I wonder about what that would feel like. How it might happen. The many ways it might happen: Getting stabbed, getting run over by a truck, the Nigeria Police, or just good old destiny: Death at 20: Natural Causes. Courtesy, God. Perhaps it would be an exciting experience. The falling before the darkness. The release from flesh. I think about death with an intense curiosity.

I couldn’t tell you what it’s like to die. I’ve never done it before. I’ve never even heard stories from dead people about what it’s like. I don’t know if it’s a pleasant experience or not; for them. I really don’t know. It’s a mystery. It really is. But it’s coming for everyone; eventually. So it makes sense to be prepared. I’m guessing you want to be prepared. I mean, you’d want to be ready to go if the time ever came – and it will. So you can probably understand why i’ve been thinking about it a lot – death.

And i’m tired. I really am. I’m not so hot about doing anything anymore. It even takes me so long to write. And it’s not like I like writing, but at least it’s something I don’t hate. And i’m growing to hate a lot of things. I’m starting to hate mornings. I definitely hate school – not the learning part, but the part where I have to prove that i’m learning. I don’t know how to explain it properly, and if I did, i’m not really in the mood. I’m starting to hate people too. I never thought it would happen. I don’t exactly know why. It’s probably something stupid and more about something that’s wrong with me and not them.

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However long you live, I think you’d want to live just long enough that you don’t become an inconvenience. I mean, you’d only want to live as long as people want you around. When nobody wants you around – when you’re about a hundred years old – you’d probably want to just go. Die a hero or live long enough to become a villain as they say. Anyhow.

I could tell you what death is like – at least for the person that’s left behind; especially if it’s someone you really love that died. There’s a lot of pain and sadness. If you’re a cryer, there’s a lot of crying too. And you miss them too. A lot. You also do a lot of wondering. You wonder about why they died – even though you know the exact cause. You wonder about what life will be like without them. Even after so many years, you wonder about how life might have been different if they didn’t die. You really hope that they’re sort of still here with you – watching over you and stuff. You wonder where they are – if you believe in some kind of after life. If there’s a bad place, you hope they’re in the good place. But if you really loved them, like if you really really loved them, you’d wish they never even died in the first place. I don’t think that’s fair – that you can’t let them just go, but that’s what happens.

Everybody wants a happy ending. Right? But it doesn’t always roll that way. So I thought I better record a little greeting, in the case of an untimely death, on my part. I mean, not that death at any time isn’t untimely.

Tony Stark (Avengers: Endgame, 2019)

I’m not planning on ending things; maybe i’m thinking about it, but it would be stupid. I only just started existing last thursday. Also, I don’t think i’m brave enough to throw myself off a building or stand right in the middle of train tracks (I’ve done the latter before but the track wasn’t in commission). I also don’t like physical pain, so i’m definitely not going to do it. I think. You don’t really know about these things. If you really get in the mood – or not in the mood to keep existing – you just might. But usually you don’t know. I don’t know.

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Boy! There’s still so much I want to do. Like, i’m very interested in rock climbing. I want to sky dive and get on a hot air balloon and do that thing where you’re sort of gliding through the air. I really want to fly. I really do. I want to be someone’s best man at their wedding. I don’t know if i’m close enough to anybody for that to ever happen, but I really want to do it. I want to bear witness to art in all its forms – high and low, tacky and exquisite. I want to be happy too. Boy! Wouldn’t that be something?

But so many people never even got to start living. I mean we remember that they were alive and that they died, but all before last thursday. So you know that that’s not true – that they ever lived. You know that they never even got a chance. But I guess they did. I mean, if we remember them, I guess that they did live. And if we still remember them, I guess that they’re real and maybe even still alive. Maybe they’re immortal even. I don’t know. But it would be something nice to know; even comforting.

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I know what it’s like to lose. To feel so desperately that you’re right, yet to fail nonetheless. It’s frightening. Turns the legs to jelly. But I ask you – To what end? Dread it. Run from it. Destiny arrives all the same.

Thanos (Avengers: Infinity War)

Many people don’t want to die. At least they don’t plan on it. I guess I should say, more specifically, that many people don’t want to die young. Whatever that means. I mean, twenty years is a lot of time to live, if you ask me. Some people never made it to three years old. Some people never even made it past the friday after the universe was created last thursday. I think it’s stupid and unrealistic to think you get to live for a hundred years. And I want to live to a hundred and twenty. But I don’t think the universe or its creators owe me life beyond right now.

Oxygen will run out tomorrow morning… and that will be it. I know I said no more surprises, but I gotta say, I was really hoping to pull off one last one. But it looks like… well, you know what it looks like. Don’t feel bad about this.

Tony Stark (Avengers: Endgame)

Considering the general nature of the epic light and dark forces in the universe, you really wonder about the survivability of it all. What are the chances of waking up in the morning? What are the chances of going to bed at night? I know that studies show this and that, but what are the real chances?

Part of the journey is the end

Tony Stark (Avengers: Endgame)

So, in the event of my passing…

I want you to cry. I want you to really cry. I want you to ask all the questions – about why it was me, why it was so untimely, why you didn’t spend more time with me, why the universe took me from you. I want you to find out why – the cause of my death. Destiny? Natural causes? God?

If it’s a person that’s responsible for my death. I want you to find them. I want you to use all the resources you have at your disposal to find them. And when you find them, I want you to let them know that I didn’t mind dying. I want you to tell them that I’m not angry or anything, and that if they’d been going around killing people and they had a lot of blood on their hands and death on their conscience, I don’t want them to feel guilty about killing me. I don’t mind, I really don’t. Or didn’t? I don’t know.

If it’s some kind of sickness. Well. I don’t know what I want you to do to be honest. I really don’t. Maybe try to prevent other people from contracting what I got? And i’m sorry if someone caught the sickness from me and if it made them feel lousy. And if they died? Boy! I didn’t mean for that to happen. You have to believe me. It wasn’t some grand scheme to die and take everyone with me. It really wasn’t. It was just an accident. A really sad accident.

I want a really nice death suit – a three piece suit with a pocket square and everything. I also want a staff – a wooden staff that’s exactly my height. I want it to have my initials carved in at the top. If my death was messy, like if my face was crushed or it didn’t look too good, you don’t have to worry about the suit. It wouldn’t do to have an open casket funeral, so the suit would be pointless. But the staff is important – not to be buried with me, but to be given to someone whom I have not yet decided (perhaps my next of kin at the time, or my lover). If no one wants it, put it next to my head stone.

I want a head stone. A really nice one. But not the kind that’s in the shape of a cross or anything. Just a big (not too big) rectangle with my name; and something cool like “A lover of family and friends” written on it. My age could be written on it too. I don’t mind. I don’t mind people knowing how young I died. You probably already know this, if you know me; but i want a headstone so that people will have a place to visit if ever they remember me (like in those american pictures where people who can’t move on keep visiting the grave of the person they lost).

I want to be buried on a rainy day. I like the rain. I really do. I think it will make for a really dramatic funeral if you happen to get it on camera – which I really really want you to. I want all the different people that I ever loved to be at my funeral. It doesn’t matter of we lost touch for a while or all we ever said to each other was hello. I want you to be there. It’ll be a really solemn affair. I want folks to say stuff about me – or to me that they wished they had said to me when I was alive. Nice things mostly – if you can help it. I don’t want to be dead and have bad things said about me. But if it’s the truth, go ahead.

I want you to remember me fondly. I hope that when you miss me – and I hope you miss me quite a lot – you look at photographs of me smiling and you listen to recordings of my voice that you saved and you watch all the videos and you read all our texts. This one. This last one might be blasphemous but; I want you to love others as I loved you. And I want you to know. I really need you to know that I loved you.

I mean, actually, if you grieve for a couple weeks… and then move on with enormous guilt.

Tony Stark (Avengers: Endgame)

But really, I hope you don’t shed a tear. I hope you breathe a sigh of relief. “At least I won’t be spending anymore of my money or time on him” I hope you think. I hope you realise that I was more trouble than I was worth. I hope you don’t care at all that I have died. I hope you feel the lightest you have ever felt.

I hope you pick a really good day to bury me. I hope you wake up excited; because it’s going be a really good day. It’s going to be a day when you’re going to do something you’ve always wanted to do – the beach? Mountain climbing? Sky diving? Anything at all exciting. I’m sorry that it’ll be on that day that you’ll have to dump my body in some river somewhere. But I hope that you spend the rest of your day doing something so amazing that you literally forget that I ever existed.

I should probably lie down for a minute, rest my eyes. Please know, when I drift off, it’ll be like everything lately, I’m fine. I’m totally fine. I dream about you. Because it’s always you.

Tony Stark (Avengers: Endgame)

I want you to miss me, but I hope you forget me. I couldn’t stand being more trouble even in death.

K. I.