Between White and Black

I do not know what happens when we die (and by we I mean any living animal). It does seem to me that the brain, and what we here in western civilization call the soul, are coherently linked. When our brains are changed either by injury, drugs or other external source so is our personality and in turn who we are changes; our soul is affected. Thoughts, feelings and actions that never would have occurred before the change now do occur because of how the brain has been changed.

So then, when my brain ceases to get enough oxygen for the cells to survive what then happens to what we call the soul? What happens to what I know to be "me"? My memories, my feelings my emotions, my thoughts...do they all move on into another form? Are they preserved somewhere? They were preserved in my brain (or maybe they were just the product of my brain), but now that brain is dead and nothing survives in it. Will my energy, chi, life force, soul or whatever you wish to call it survive the disconnection from the brain in which it has been housed and developed? If my soul does survive do my memories carry over as well? After all, I would surely cease to be who I am if I were to lose my memories and experiences, right? Death is an unknown to me and therefore I fear it. It brings a great amount of sadness to me thinking about everyone I know ceasing to exist. Everything they were, are and ever will be stopping in a single instant never to return.

Prior to me leaving on my travels I feared that death would come to someone close to me and Joey did cross my mind in those thoughts. Now it seems this fear may come true. Our family cat, Joey, is unhealthy and is dieing.

Joey is around 14 years old; near the average age for an indoor cat to live to. Joey lives his life primarily outdoors coming in only when he is hungry, cold or wants to be sit on someones lap to be pet. The average life expectancy of an outdoor cat is significantly lower then an indoor cat because cats that spend a lot of time outside have to dodge traffic, humans, other cats and disease. Joey has had his cat fights in the past and one of them nearly killed him. In this case, Joey's kidneys are failing him. I do not expect he will live much longer. One way or the other it seems he will die shortly.

The thought of having another animal "put down" is one of conflict for me. It reminds me of having to kill my dog Charlie; something I still have conflict with even today. Watching my dog cease to be was extremely hard for me and to know that it was us that were doing the killing. We chose her death to come sooner in life because we did not want her to suffer a life of pain, misery and suffering. I do truly hope that we made the right decision, but I suppose that we will never know. We could never ask Charlie how she felt. We could never ask what she wanted. We had to guess that she must not be able to enjoy parts of her life because of the pain that she was experiencing.

I think the situation with Joey is much more black and white. Charlie was not suffering from a terminal illness, whereas Joey's kidneys are failing. He has surely already started down a path of deterioration which will eventually lead to a painful death if nothing is done about it.