The Best of Times, and the Worst of Times

Terri Schiavo is the focus of a debate that is leaving not only this nation but even individuals torn between themselves. My wife, and no doubt many others, have expressed vehement outrage and indignation at what the "other side" has been saying. The problem is, she has felt just as strongly supportive and dismissive of both other sides in this matter.

Therein lies the struggle that most of us are ultimately dealing with on the deepest levels.

Almost every one of us quake in horror at the thought of being kept alive with no brighter future than the prospect of being prevented from dying.

Unless she really isn't a rutabaga.

Or unless aggressive treatment would truly offer some realistic hope of a meaningful recovery.

How can you possibly countenance starving and dehydrating a thinking, feeling human being to death?

Unless she really is a rutabaga.

Unless she really is little more than warmer than room temperature flesh too stupid to die.

The biggest problem here is that both sides of the debate are highly impassioned in their positions. Facts are copious, but offered by the presenter with such passion and slant that the average political campaign seems clear cut and uncontested by comparison. Information is available to all of us, but truth is only known to those intimately involved. And even for them, it is easy to believe that mutually exclusive truths exist.

Terri Schiavo is a witless pawn in a debate with ramifications for all of us that dwarf her puny individual life and death drama. Puny at least in the grand scheme of six billion other humans sharing her planet. Puny in the absence of 24x7 wall to wall media coverage and pontification.

Whether she is aware now, will soon be in a place where she can be aware, or if as some assert awareness after death is a bunch of pull the covers over your head feel good mumbo jumbo, perhaps she and we can all take some comfort that Terri's life, and more importantly the nature of her death, will have contributed to a better understanding for each of us what quality of life and the options and means of leaving life or clinging to it signify.

Perhaps too, it will encourage more of us to have the compassion for our loved ones to write a living will. To make our wishes clearly known in advance so that family, friends, and strangers with divergent agendas and world views needn't fight over our not quite lifeless bodies.

Anyone who doesn't care enough to take an explicit hand in charting the course of their own future lacks any legitimate standing to take part in determining how the existence of another adult human being should be continued or curtailed.

For a substantial portion of the population these truly are the best of times. And the worst of times. And perhaps that is the sort of contradiction that establishes the most productive of times for all of us.