Near Death

i almost died today. Like, George bush choking on a pretzel, near death experience died.
I was moments from death, milliseconds. I've been seconds from death before, stuck in a kayak underwater, but all I got was a flash of worry that my mother will cry a lot. Tonight, the significance of life was realized, and the fear of death was instilled. Life is gloryful.

Last week I spent my days reading a combination of my journals from age 12-18 with Catcher in the Rye. Reading the two parallel to each other was interesting to say the least, but undoubtedly it was an intense experience. I told Audrey and Andrella this, as we sat around her patio and smoked herb. Every joke and cute moment since I finished reading my journals, has been a possible ending for that journey that I just took. We then spent several moments laughing, and deciding that that was the end. Then laughing, and then deciding that THAT was the end, etc, etc.

We went further back than adolescence, too. We went back to the time we discovered our clitori. We remembered being about 3 years old, thinking you had a big secret... or feeling like you invented something great, thinking you'd spread the word to the world. We laughed so hard and not only did my eyes cry, but i lizzed, which apparently means peeing a little bit from laughing so hard. I lizzed a lot tonight. And honestly, if I had died tonight, it would have been an okay ending. Sure, I was about to embark on an amazing journey and it got cut short, and Sure i didn't accomplsh anything that I really wanted to accomplish, but I did overcome some obstacles, and I did experience happiness. I experienced true bliss and I experienced worship, I expeirenced pain, I experienced awe, and I experienced the cleansing feeling of rain. I felt forgiven, I felt relieved, I felt elated, and I've felt deceived just to be reminded that everything is as it is, and is as it should be.

And I can't phrase the language in any form other than what I just expressed because I am limited by my Zeitgeist and the language of our times. Life is fucking precious once you''ve invested something in it. And even if you have yet to invest anything in your life, its still precious because its a chance and it shouldn't be missed, you know what i mean?

Later as we sat inside relishing the taste of southern cooking and being in love with the southern culture, we thought about how the best food makes you stop eating it with minimal bites. That morning I had had the most heavenly meal at a restaurant in DC, and I stopped eating as soon as I was full and I was so immensely content that I needed not one more bite. We ate nachos with a dip that her father had made, and it was good, but it was also addictive. Spicy foods can do that to you. So was it good or bad that it was addictive? I said it was bad because even if I wanted to stop eating, I couldn't. I'd have to move away from the food to make my hand stop reaching for it because my mouth longed for some more spice and was bored with its lack of a job. Earlier that morning, my tastebuds were in awe of the food they had just received, and stood back and watched it digest, like waving goodbye to an old friend, and standing there past the point where they can see you.

Once when my friend left me on my doorstep, I stayed there for the next 4 hours until the sun set. I brought out a lawn chair and just sat, waiting and seeing if my friend maybe would come back because we had such a good time. They never did come back, but I finished reading Catcher in the Rye and some of my old journals, and sat on that porch where he'd left me.

Wasn't food similar to a friend? Or rather, a beautiful vacation from which you return relieved, relaxed, and ready to do non food related activities because you had been satisfied in that area.

I then began to scarf down the final remains of garlic that were infused in the nacho dip, but had been neglected since being finished. I didn't know it was garlic, and was surprised to find that they weren't as pungent as usual. Maybe my tastebuds were shot. But I could feel that a little piece had gotten stuck in my throat. It should come out eventually, I thought, not having access to water. Then Audrey said something that made me laugh. She does that a lot. This night had already been filled with laughter, and good laughter too, the type that makes you cry, or pee your pants a little bit, or forget how to breathe. In this case, I laughed so hard the piece of garlic dislodged itself into a less convenient place, and took hold of my airways. I coughed first a little bit. It got stuck more. My body automatically started convulsing, trying to rid itself of its enemy. I couldn't breathe. I kept coughing. I really couldn't breathe. It'll be okay. No, I can't breathe. The air was stuck between a tiny piece of garlic, lodged in my throat somewhere and there was nothing I could do about it. I kept coughing, but at this point it wasn't coughing. It had becoming choking. Coughing requires some passage of air, but none was getting through. I didn't even think about my mother. My thoughts went straight to Life. I'm really not ready. I kept choking. I really don't want to go. I kept choking. I was holding on to the railing of Audrey's porch, looking down onto the stairs covered in tarp, and amidst my bodys attempt to cough, it tried to throw up. My body didn't know what to do anymore. It couldn't gag, it couldn't throw up, it couldn't breathe. it was failing at ilving, something so easily done up until now. Andrella and Audrey didn't know what to do. All the while they probably were thinking I was just coughing, but I motioned to them that this was serious, and Andrella moved hopefully to give me some sort of help. I hoped she had read those manuals in restaurants about how to save a choking person, doing the arm thrust into the stomach thing, but I didn't think either of them would know what to do. But without any help, my body managed somehow to get the piece out on its own. As soon as it flew out of my mouth, my throat still wouldn't breathe. It was scared and not sure if it could expand and collapse with the intake and output of air.

Air. Air. It was really nice to breathe air. But my throat was still worried, but my soul and my brain weren't so worried anymore. Audrey and Andrella stood in shock. They didn't know what had just happened. Or they couldn't believe it. I was still in shock, but I figured the way to move on from shock was to say something, so I established the following: "Shit, I just almost died!" and I started laughing in fear and disbelief. Audrey and Andrella nodded their heads like, yeah. It was quiet for a second more, until Audrey said "Hey, well lucky that there's a handrail and some covering on the stairs down there, huh?" and we all laughed because, well, it was sorta true. It's like the universe covered the stairs with tarp to protect it from my gagging body, and the handrail was just there for support in these rough times... not as a precaution, but as an actual useful staple of patios.

Audrey went to get me some water, and I reflected quietly as Andrella comforted me silently. It was crazy to think with just a tiny piece of garlic, my entire life could be shut down. Is there something else in control or was that just luck? Or rather, the bad luck? Was it just a coincidence that I was going to have to fight for my life, or was it part of a plan? It seemed very much like a plan, because it was less than a millimeter of space that decided whether or not I would ever get any air into my lungs again. It was less than a millimeter of space that kept me from getting my body looked over by a mortician, determining that the cause of death was, indeed, choking on a piece of garlic.

I thought of George Bush, and the depiction of his choking on a pretzel or having a near heart attack during running, and how that led to him being born again, and I got scared of that religious feeling, the looming fatherly figure protecting his children in the pews. I quickly disclaimed that sort of spirituality, and looked at the moon. It was almost full. It'd be full on Wednesday. It was the night between Sunday and Monday, the place between Sun and Moon. Isn't that a strange coincidence? That I, being on the cusp of Cancer and Leo, Moon and Sun (fire) signs respectively, should almost die. Ashley had told me the stars were in Capricorn tonight. I wonder what else about the stars influenced this event tonight.

Now my soul is floating around my body, asking me if its okay to come in again, asking me wehther its safe or not. Last night after I returned home, I brushed my teeth in the presence of ghosts. But this is a new house, so the only ghost here is my ghost of the past, the part of me that died when I was 13, only to be partially reborn 5 years later. I remember when that rebirth happened. I was smoking weed with my ex boyfriend, and all of a sudden all my memories came back to me. Everything from before Tomas, before the Crips. Everything was restored to its original position, in worse condition than before like an apartment rented to a bunch of fraternity brothers. My memories weren't all there, weren't all complete, but at least I had some of the sentimentality back.

And what do I call this? A "Near Death experience?" How cliche. But that's what it was. Oh, whats happening is so cliche. Girl goes to college, girl gets into grad school, girl is reborn from adolescent trauma, girl almost chokes to death and reconsiders her life.

I mean, I don't know what sort of message I'm supposed to get out of this. I don't know if this is a legitimate threat from the higher powers of the universe. But if its meant to be its meant to be is all that I can know. I can't really try to decipher a message from the greater world, but I can certainly pay attention to it, see how it fits to the rest of the messages that are coming through. If it doesn't add up, then the message isn't finished being transmitted. I'd rather wait to figure out if thats all, than to try to decipher it and come to a premature conclusion about what this all means. For now I'll just breathe and enjoy breathing air.