Commander Cream #2

There have been three times in my life when I sincerely believed that I was about to die. Not the “I could be dead in a year” feeling that I got when I was misdiagnosed with melanoma, but instead the sudden “I’m going to die in the next thirty seconds and I never tried cantaloupe” sense. I tell two of the stories frequently because they’re funny and showcase my stupidity. But this question really reminded me of the third story.

My senior year in high school I went with three friends to visit another friend who was off in college. It was a 60-mile drive: not too bad on a Sunday morning with friends. On this particular morning the traffic was fairly light. No one was indulging in road rage and the road had been cleared of snow (it was January). About forty minutes into our trip we hit a patch of black ice. Almost invisible and exceptionally slippery, black ice causes innumerable accidents every year. Catherine lost control of the car. So there we were, four high school seniors spinning uncontrollably on a six-lane highway while cars screeched around us. Some people say that accidents happen so quickly that they cannot remember what took place afterwards. I wish that that had happened to me. Instead I can vividly recall the scene: Catherine was desperately fighting the steering wheel. Kinji was screaming, her face buried in her hands. I had careened into Laura when the car first began to slide- her fingers were gripping my upper arm with a strength born of fear and helplessness (she was wearing purple nail-polish). I remember seeing a huge pile of filthy ice and snow where a plow had dumped its load. I remember hoping that we’d crash into it if there were a chance of a gasoline fire.

And then it was over. Through some amazing driving skills and serendipity, we had avoided all the other cars. We even avoided the guardrail and came to rest on the verge. The four of us sat there for at least a minute in utter silence. I pried Laura’s fingers off my bruised arm. Finally, we looked at each other and burst out laughing. There was probably a touch of hysteria in our laughter, but there was also the realization that we were alive. We were alive and life was good. No, life was more than good. I realized that I wanted to be alive- I wanted to be alive more than anything else in this world.

Some sociobiologists say that we want to live only because evolution has formed us that way. As humans, we are merely products of evolution and “selfish genes” that force us to live and propagate. People like Mother Theresa who have no children and work selflessly for others are abnormalities, flukes, or in Catholic dogma, saints. I don’t believe it. Perhaps it’s just the way our cultures and societies have grown and evolved, but I’m not living so that my genes can be passed on in perpetuity. I am living because life is beautiful. If I spent the rest of my life traveling, there would always be more to see and do. I have never run a marathon, nor seen Marathon, Greece. I have never visited the pyramids nor painted a self-portrait. Even without the monuments that humans have built, there are natural places in this world so heartbreakingly lovely that I cannot imagine dying without seeing them one more time. No matter how jaded I become (and believe me, I am jaded), I know that I always retain the capacity to grow and experience.

This knowledge is part of why I cannot pretend to understand the mentality behind suicide. I have never entered a time in my life when I have contemplated leaving this world prematurely. However, several of my friends have committed suicide. Before one of them died, he told me that life was the gradual realization that you are alone. As a friend, I wish that I had done more to prevent him from feeling that way. I will live with that regret for the rest of my life. And maybe that’s why I have never considered suicide: I have friends that will never let me feel truly isolated.

So why is life worth living? In a nutshell: good friends, incredible vistas, learning opportunities, laughter, fear, love, hope, family, sunsets and sunrises, music, and all the millions of things that I haven’t done yet. Yes, there are ugly things like wars, illnesses and hatred. But even during those times, I want to live to see the world after the ugliness is gone.