What's it All About?

          Mortality featured prominently on my agenda last week, beginning on Monday, when my Other Half and I finally got around to consulting a solicitor about amending our wills. We want to gift funds to the likes of Liberty, Greenpeace and Amnesty, in the hopeful expectation that these organisations will continue to fight the good fight long after we are deceased, for there is no definitive victory currently in sight.

          Then, on Tuesday, at our regular philosophy discussion session, some of the Ancient Greeks’ ideas on life and death were explored. I was gratified to learn that there was little or no nonsense about an ‘afterlife’ – at least not as far as Leucippus and Democritus were concerned. They had proposed the theory that everything in the universe is made up of indivisible particles called atoms (yes, 2,000 years before the science of physics emerged), thereby establishing the case for the ultimate recycling of life: ‘dust-to-dust’.

          Unfortunately, one of our number revealed during our discussions that he had a terminal illness and was trying to face up to the prospect of palliative care. Whether our discussion had prompted his revelation I couldn’t be sure, but I fear ours was not the most sympathetic forum in which to raise the matter, since philosophy tends to focus on the logical, not the emotional. I, for one, was stuck for words. But, that same afternoon – and entirely by coincidence – I attended a family funeral, at which I experienced the opposite: the overwhelming of logical discourse by the tide of emotion.

          It seems to me sensible not to hasten one’s own demise, which is one reason why I avoid risk of physical injury and always* take the doctors’ advice about maintaining a healthy lifestyle. Hence, I was at the clinic this morning for a covid vaccination boost. I had also organised a routine blood test appointment ten minutes later, followed by a visit to the nearby shop so as to optimise use of time and effort.

          These days, a visit to our clinic is an eerie, non-contact experience. The two receptionists (who, on this occasion, outnumbered the waiting patient) are redundant, apparently: unless, perchance, you are unable to negotiate the self-check-in screen and subsequent directions to take off your shoes and step onto a machine that records your vital statistics and sends the results directly to your digital record. I have heard that there are doctors on the premises, but I have never seen one.

          There is, certainly, a woman, dressed like a nurse, who takes blood samples and sends them off for analysis. The last time I tried to engage with her about the whys and wherefores of the process, I discovered that she doesn’t do interpretation or explanation. She does excel, however, at small talk (the weather being a classic opener). When she asked me which arm I would like to proffer, I pointed to the left one and joked that it had already been stabbed once, so I would prefer to keep at least one uninjured limb. “Was it the covid vaccination?”, she asked. “Yes”, I said, “better safe than sorry.” I was expecting her to nod approvingly but, instead, she implied that it was a waste of time and, when pressed, hinted that she didn’t believe the science. “Well, you hear so many stories”, she said. I wouldn’t be surprised if, next time I go, they tell me she’s emigrated to Texas, where the wages for vampiric operatives are more generous, and patients don’t ask awkward medical questions.

          Assuming I survive the next two weeks, I shall propose at the next philosophy session that we discuss whether we are wasting our time, considering how some people appear to be regressing to beliefs held prior to the 5^th century BC.

*Reduction of red wine intake is work-in-progress.