Death's and Unknown's

I died yesterday. For the first time throughout my short 19 years of existence, I fell completely asleep at the wheel on a major highway.

I’m not really sure how it happened, but I can tell you that when I finally woke up I didn’t scream, I didn’t cry, and I didn’t pull off onto the side of the road. I didn’t see my life flash before my eyes. I just calmly took in the fact that I had been swerving in and out of lanes at 70 mph during my sleep. I don’t even know why I had chosen to wake up (in fact, I don’t know how I had fallen asleep)—I hadn’t woken up through the loud music, the cars beeping. It made me feel something I hadn’t felt before. It wasn’t a feeling of gratitude, and it wasn’t a feeling of fear. But the feeling filled me up with an unknown emptiness, and I could only name it as death.

My dreams that night got me tossing and turning in bed. The dream involved whales, drowning, and expensive buffet lines. I woke up with a heart burning through my chest, and it let me know I was still alive.