Sunday, April 5, 2015

D: A Writer's Musings On Death

The letter D
Today it's late. We've been preparing for Easter stuff all day, decorating eggs, and hiding eggs this evening that I just don't have the time to come up with a sci-fi short for you guys today. I'm terribly sorry. I'll be back to my regularly scheduled flash fiction pieces Monday with the letter E.

Anyhow... today on the eve before Easter (well it's 1am here so I guess it is already Easter- whoops) I wanted to discuss death. Namely two points.

First, once we finished decorating the Easter Eggs my three year old comes up, points to the eggs, and asks where the babies are.

I swear I have no clue how my THREE yr old knows that any sorts of babies come out of eggs- I'm not even sure if he was thinking about chicken eggs. I was primarily mortified that we were going to eat the eggs tomorrow and he's thinking there are babies inside. EEP! 

So I just let him know that no, there are no babies in these eggs. These ones are for eating.

Why, was his next question. Well folks, I'm not about to go there. I just repeated that these ones are for eating.

So, of course, that led me on to thinking about how we first learn, while we are little, about what life and death is. We are sad when we are told our batteries are dead. I have seen people wonder how kids handle a death in the family. Trust me, if they can understand batteries dying than they understand the immensity of a loved one dying.


Some people cry at funerals, some people don't.  Each person has their own unique views on death. Perhaps they are happy or relieved because that person is no longer in pain. Or maybe they think that person has been reborn. And I guess it's just because it is one in the morning but suddenly I realized something else. Spock was reborn... wait, Spock... Star Trek... 

Star Trek has some weird ways of handling death as well!


"He's Dead Jim."- Dr. McCoy, Star Trek 

Oh, we will just stick you in a torpedo tube and launch you into space to the tune of taps. Never mind your family back on Earth or whatever planet they live on. We will send them a video letter letting them know.  How come no one visits grave sites to talk to their loved ones or to leave flowers any more? How did we get so far advanced that this aspect became lost completely.

You can'd blame it on lack of space. It's not like the ship shrank when that person dies. Have you seen the holodeck? They have room to keep a sealed coffin somewhere till their next docking. Ships like Voyager, facing a 30+ year mission home? Ok we can cut them some slack. But how come Spock got the torpedo tube? (Maybe I missed that reasoning in the movie) Why didn't Spock's body get kept so they could deliver it to Vulcan? Of course, then he never would have been reborn. But yeah.

Anyway- I'm sorry for having only the ramblings of a tired writers mind to give to you all today. I promise to write up something cool for Monday though!

Today's post was inspired by the letter D. D is for: Death in Space  as part of the Blogging from A to Z April 2015 challenge! Click on the letter to join on in the fun!

Every day (excluding sundays) I will be writing a post about something that begins with the letter for that day. Most of the time you will find a sci-fi flash fiction piece here.

For Readers: Do you have something that starts with the letter E that you would like me to try to incorporate into monday's short story? I'm always open to suggestions!

For now- I'm heading to bed!


Happy Easter Everyone! Thanks for putting up with my musings today.

2 comments:

  1. I can't remember what I thought about death when I was little but I had lots of pets and understood that death meant things went away or got buried in the garden. I don't remember feeling particularly bothered, just sad that those animals wouldn't be around any more.

    I think in honour of you son's comments you should use 'Easter' or 'eggs' in your story on Monday. ;-)

    Cait @ Click's Clan

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    1. Hmm... eggs... I might just be able to make that work! lol

      Thanks for stopping by Cait! (oh and thanks for putting up with my sleepy nonsensical ramblings lol)

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