I used to have a teacher at secondary school called Mrs De’ath. I never saw her as the harbinger of doom but just another adult with a slightly French sounding name. The innocence of youth gradually slipping to the realisation that death is all around us, shadowing our every move. On the news in our personal lives. Gunmen running amok in schools. The first part of life is generally great where you just have the odd moment of death in your life. Pet cat, extremely old grandparents, distant acquaintance at school. As you age then it gradually becomes increasingly central to your life. Mortality is up front and central. Cancer crawling around inside people, pulling rugs from lives. Kids left stranded, fending with the parent who is left. Grief rippled through their conscious and subconscious. Refugees fleeing death and risking almost certain catastrophe through cramming onto overly small boats, wobbling across the channel. Iconic and less known musicians die. They don’t go on for ever which seemed to be the case when you were growing up, Everyone was immortal. Friends phone with news of close family members. The cancer has come back, just a few weeks to live. It is something we all carry with us but reality bites hard, takes us away from moments of extreme joy dancing in fields or watching the sun gradually set over a blue, green, orange, yellow sky. Walking or cycling to work, any moment could be a slip where you fall off the pavement or the back wheel slips and death comes roaring into view. You could just stay at home, frozen in stasis, safe from harm although that meteorite heading for earth could come screaming down and finish it all for everyone. Climate change, the death of the planet is ingrown for children of today. Welcome to your world, which we have managed to f+ck. Streams of traffic stuck bumper to bumper in city after city. The world distracting itself by suggesting that they are tackling global warming. Mass queues in airports as passengers fight for connecting flights, oblivious to their part in the planet’s downfall. Pollution, poisoning millions of people daily. Invisible fumes that activate cancer cells. The old days of smoking in shops, bars, homes gone as the most direct health risk is tackled whilst leaving a whole host of others gapingly open. Food. What’s on your plate, a rainbow of colours mimicking the setting sun? Or is it just overcast and grey. Beige. The colour of death. Youth still have technicolour lives, tik tok inspired over bright gaudy flashy sickly multitude of colours whereas the ageing sit in light brown piss stinking armchairs waiting for the chance to exit. Losing their mind as friends and family gather around, a ritual as we see off one more member of our tribe.
