For the past one week, I have been thinking about my future, in a strikingly unconventional manner. My current income-less profession is at an end in my country, and I am almost on the verge of laying waste to my plans for local employment in social work. Many times I tell people that my profession is somewhat extinct, and social workers (cum natural-disaster relief workers) like myself are fossilized or in “the process” of being a pitiful relic ~ on a good day, this becomes a contemptuous, mocking joke for me.
Mortality is not a subjective concern for me. Inevitable that one day I will kick the bucket, though naturally I’m unsure of when and where. Don’t matter “how” as I have adapted, about two decades ago, a fatalistic approach towards Life. When I was young, I had a morbid fascination of death, I had thought it would be fitting for someone like me to die in some war-torn country or at least during my tour of duty in a famine-stricken hellhole. Nowadays, being a single parent to a teenager, I am cautious of my safety. Yet it does not stop me from thinking about it and whatever madness that snowballs in my overactive mind.
Parting with life, the last breath, probably the sudden amazement to the (un)expected darkness. Imagination to an odd feeling of captivation. I do not fear dead, though I think I may have regrets during the last moments before being lifeless. Unfinished roles to the two people that I love.
Anyhow, when I think about my mortality, I think of the past: the challenges, the misery, the joy, the love, and the periods of erratic rampage. Such awareness sometimes causes a minor anxiety-attack, but then again, that is to be expected. My past, like many others, is not a bed roses.
I plan to give myself another 4 days of contemplation, followed by a short celebration of life, then back to the reality. Life is too short, but what the heck, I plan to put it to good use.
Zashnain
An avid blogger, twitterer and photojournalist, Zashnain Zainal suffers from an incurable addiction to social work, helping marginalised communities since 1989. Nowadays he travels from the plantations of Malaysia to the slums of Thailand. He can be found at zashnain.com and @bedlamfury
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