I've been thinking a lot lately about my own mortality. I suppose that is normal after losing someone so close. One thing I am fairly certain of is that I have lost my fear of death. Not that I'm in a big hurry to go or anything like that but it isn't as much of a mystery to me as it once was. I remember when I was a little girl it frightened me to think that I was going to die. My concept of death was only that I would be alone. I remember telling my mother that if I died I wanted to be buried with my favorite doll. My perception of death was not of being asleep but of just being alone. I've been reading a book by Dr. Elizabeth Kuebler Ross on life after death. I read her first book on the subject and this one is very similar. It has several accounts of near death experiences and in the latter part of her career she focused on children. It is very interesting but I can also see why it is controversial to many people. It seems to me that religion often perpetuates the fear of death. You'd think it would be just the opposite. I always thought that people of faith would have the least fear of death. My mother had a very religious mother who was often over-the-top when it came to religion. She preached and reminded everyone of all that went against her own beliefs. It was a sin for women to wear shorts, it was a sin to dance, etc. etc. I remember how we were always a little tense when grandmother was around for fear that we would be admonished for some sin or another. It seems the more she tried to force religion on us the more we pushed away. The thing is, her type of religion was everything negative. A person had no chance of being good enough. I think that is why my mother struggled with it so much. She tried so hard to be good enough but always worried that she wasn't. In the end I believe she realized just what a good person she was and just how loving God is.