Why do we smile when someone takes a picture of us? Something happens when a person sees a photograph of himself, a certain relationship develops between the present version of himself and the past one, a dialogue is born. It is in the fog of memory where we seek the hope that our life has had direction and meaning—where it tries to explain and convince herself, a solace where the mind projects, that the life it has led has value in how it has responded to the vicissitudes of Being.
Maybe that’s why we smile; so that, when we see the photograph, we let our past presence convince us that it has purpose.
The enterprise of professional funeral photographer has not yet germinated. That person would surely seek to capture the full ethos of the moment: individual photographs, now just the siblings, now a group shot. He would zoom-in at the long faces, letting the tears swell. “Everybody say cheese!” Tag. #MissYouBert.
We feel the need to justify ourselves, to tell ourselves that life has been good and relevant and happy. No regrets. After all, that is the thelos of all human life.
The deep, resounding bells arrive, those constant, existential caresses that remind us that life—that which we call “life”—will end; sowing in our spirit the memory that we will have but one last conscious thought, and then, our vision will blacken. Every cell of our body will stay quiet, and our presence will be immobile; and our body shall be received by the darkness of the earth.
Perhaps, in those moments we will ask ourselves the important questions, those which we passed our entire life avoiding. And we will bring to our mind the good things, everything we have valued until then—our loved ones, possessions, resentments; and we will try to respond with our old molds, our smiling photographs. But, In the face of imminent silence, they would, too, prove ineffective. As our heart begins to languish, those questions pick up force. What am I? What is to become of me? What purpose did my life have? We will possibly think of a god—that self-forged image we called god, to whom we rendered tribute. If not by our good actions we will seek to numb the questions with the belief that our intentions were noble; but even that idea would seem to not console at the sound of the aborning death rattle. The heart squeezes one last time. Our mind begins to cool; and, with a light taste of vomit at the mouth, with a tear drying on cheek, and the questions lingering still, we will sigh one final time. And the memory of our life will live through a couple of dissolving prayers.
Ultimately, death is an act of faith.
Picture: To comlpetely dissolve, by deadendsoul
