DNR
so i guess erik's grandmother had "signed a DNR," or so my good friends on ER say.

i had always wondered about that process. i generally envisioned super old women who were widowed already, or young, hip, progressive twenty-somethings. those YHP20s may have a terminal disease, but that really wasn't part of the picture i created. but at what point did they sign that form, and how did they feel about that? was it a liberating swoosh of control-via-squandering-control? or was it i-know-i'm-doing-the-right-thing-so-why-the-lump-in-my-throat?? the big form, which, in my picture, looked much like an INS application for naturalization N-400 form looming the giant sans-serif all-caps lettering of "DO NOT RESUSCITATE." well, the spelling wasn't part of this visage.

i'm sure i would be in the latter group. i wouldn't see it as liberating. of course, i'd know i was supposed to be liberated, and i'd most likely have some sort of terminal or almost-terminal condition. i wouldn't feel at peace with my DNR form. or waiver. i wonder if it's even a form, now that i think of it. perhaps it's nothing more than a single checkbox with a line for your signature. one of those lines that aren't big enough, smushing your gorgeous, well-practiced signature into one indistinguishable word.

i wouldn't be able to sign one. mostly because i can't understand death. i can't understand eternity. i'm not quite there.

perhaps i need to focus on understanding resuscitation first. i could understand what my un-life would comprise. nothing. vegetation. beeping. tubes.