I've been a'dying a few times. Thank G-d, I did not, and I am very very thankful for those repreives. I was obviouysly dying -- death was more certain than not. And I might have asked floks not to be sad, but to what end? Their sadness was already real and I was not yet dead! When I survived in, in most cases of family and friends, they had already made me as if dead in their minds. Recapturing a "fullness of my own life" in the minds of most except the most initmate -- my wife, for example, is almost impossible. Somehow, in their minds, as I perceive it again and again, it is as if I am not really here, or still about to check out, my very existence with them is discounted, it is quite maddening should I not see it as very human.
And of the "dead", they are dead. There is no dialogue. In my case both the first and second premises of the quote are not found as fact.
