Erik was not an an old man and many would wonder why it was his time to go. The Erik I knew wanted to live. From the time I met him, he continued to undergo painful, seemingly endless procedures; surgeries, chemotherapy, and radiation to try to rid his body of the terrible cancer that invaded it. He had to give up his car but he still tried to take walks until his exhaustion was so great that he once remarked with embarrassment, “I’m in bed about 22 hours of every day...” Others tried to get him to live somewhere where he would be better cared for, anywhere but the three story home he loved so much. But he refused to be treated like an invalid. Yes, Erik wanted to live... Unfortunately, he wanted to smoke more.
You see, Erik was one of those people who was sure it wouldn’t happen to him: lung cancer, that is. You know the type: “I started as a kid, and I’ve never been sick a day in my life” and “smoking is one of my few pleasures” or worse yet, “I was born to smoke.” I sometimes wonder why people who are heading down a direct path to self destruction cannot see that the only reason anybody says anything to them about it, is because they actually care. Unfortunately, I did not know Erik long enough to make a difference in his smoking and I can only pray that I made some small difference in his life, through the occasional chats and good wishes that we shared. I will certainly miss him.
The night he died, even though he’d been in the hospital for a few days, I held out hope he would soon be back home. But I already knew something was terribly wrong when Amazon Sage stayed with me, in my dreams; guiding me from one painful experience to another. It was as if I was in the body of a person who was dying. I saw pure water turn into black liquid draining from faucets and running down the street; as if the life force itself, was draining out. In the same dream my deceased father, who always comes around when I am dealing with something painful, set an exquisite table of food and drink, as if to help someone transition to the other side. I knew then, that somebody close to me was dying.
So for all you smokers out there, and chewers, and pipe or cigar suckers...Why quit? Because nicotene addicts can and do die young. But more importantly, because when you choose to take your own life in that way, others who know you suffer as well. After all, we are all in this world together. Please check it out, my friends: http://whyquit.com/whyquit/
