That message is simple: When you come to one of the many moments in life when you must give an account of yourself, provide a ledger of what you have been, and done, and meant to the world, do not, I pray, discount that you filled a dying man’s days with a sated joy, a joy unknown to me in all my prior years, a joy that does not hunger for more and more, but rests, satisfied. In this time, right now, that is an enormous thing.
Paul Kalanithi, When Breath Becomes Air
Absolutely GUTTED by this book. Sobbed my way through the last half. Connected to it. Stomach sickened by it. Heart broken from it.
And yet, it's infiltrated my thoughts since finishing it. To be so close to life + death every day and suddenly, face to face with it.
I thought of my mom. Of our final days with her in the ICU. Of the book SHE so desperately wanted to write. But, her time was cut short, so short. I think if my mama had been able to pen her thoughts into a manuscript, it would mimic Paul's in many ways.
And true to what I assumed, this book has made me want to finish my own.
I believe this man's life and essentially, his death, will walk along side of those of us who have read it for many years to come. Hard stuff, but, such good stuff, too.