Is today a good day to die?

My cat is probably dead right now.  She had a 5pm appointment with the "big needle", and it's 5.30 as I write this, so...

The trouble with my cat is that we have known for a while that she isn't very well and dying of natural causes would probably be hideously unpleasant.  Dying in one's sleep is the "dream", but it isn't a common way to go.  It certainly doesn't seem like something my cat would do.  She's a hanger-oner.  She would keep trundling on, even as she became more and more emaciated.

When your pet suddenly deteriorates and is obviously in quite a lot of pain, it's easier to make the call to take it to the vet.  When they are slowly deteriorating, on the other hand, it's hard to notice how far they've passed the post.  They still seem relatively okay, in the grand scheme of things.  Not noticeably worse than yesterday...

And then one day you realise that things are bad, they're never going to get any better, and you can't win the war - just prolong it.  But still, you need something to noticeably change in order to spur you into action, when it comes to killing a beloved pet.  If it's not the pet, then it's going to be something in the surrounding environment.  And then, even though it is a kindness, you still feel like you killed something you love for relatively pathetic reasons.

Without a sudden, sharp decline in the pet's health, it never seems like a good time to put them down.

But, let's face it, there is no good way to die.  However it happens, it's going to suck.  It's going to suck for the nearly departed, and it's going to suck for the people left behind.  

That goes for all of us.

Natural causes are usually awful, and the alternatives consist of a) being killed and eaten by wild animals, b) being killed in battle and c) being killed by a freak accident.  These options are not very accessible in the comfy middle-class environment of the 21st Century.

I think the Vikings (and Klingons) had the right idea.  Convince yourself that it is good and glorious to die in battle.  Death is unpleasant, but quick, and you spend your last moments on Earth thinking "yes, I got this bit right!"

Certainly better than dying of natural causes, or waiting for someone you love to look at you and say "yep, time to kill her."

Today is as good a day as any other.

And it sucks.