I know that people die, that we’ll all die eventually. But something about Chris Laurie’s death is really bothering me.
This semester I seemed to be inundated with death, having to read books for my Aging course, and having read “The Year of Magical Thinking” for HBSE. What strikes me about death is that from what I’ve seen is that the pain never seems to dull. It may subside momentarily, but it never dulls. I drive more carefully on the freeway, I carry my pepperspray from my car to the door of my house in a futile attempt to curb my chances of dying. It isn’t death that I fear, it’s the unexpected nature by which it can creep up on anyone. No one is exempt. I guess that’s what bothers me about Chris’ death.
While saying no one is exempt, I backhandedly say “but why Greg Laurie’s kid?” And even more fervently, why a husband? Why a father? Why an expectant father? Chris’ death bothers me because it seems the clutches of death creep ever nearer as I get older. I’ve never had anyone in my family die, and so far Chris Laurie is the closest it’s gotten. Even though I never met him, I feel like I’ve lost an extended family member. Someone I never knew, but always knew was there.
I fear the death of people close to me the most. While I’m excited to get married, I’m also extremely scared of the possibility of losing the person I’m closest to. Maybe I do believe that caricature of God, where once everything is going well something catastrophic will happen. I need to fix that distorted perception, because I can’t live my whole life in fear of a cosmic being whose only purpose is to make sure I don’t get too comfortable. 
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