After reflecting further on the 40th anniversary of my father’s passing, I realized something unsettling: death has always been an enemy to me, never a friend. That paradox, fearing it, resisting it, trying to understand it, is one I still grapple with.

There are moments when the thought of death doesn’t come gently but crashes through me like a rapid, rogue wave. The raw realization that one day I will no longer be here, that once gone, I will never be again. The words themselves get stuck in my throat. My stomach churns, my body tenses, and a wave of nausea rises, as if my very cells recoil from the enormity of it. It’s not so much sadness as vertigo, the dizzying edge of contemplating my own absence. Is that egotistical? Narcissist? I should ask my trusted therapist, Tristen, next time we talk.

What makes it unbearable are the details. One day, I will never again hold my husband’s hand or laugh and love my sons with an exuberant joy that lights up my entire being. I will never giggle and wonder with my youngest about how and why people annoy us on our ‘treadmill talks’ nor travel to some distant place with my oldest and share in the discovery of something new. I will never again strike a match to my favorite milk candle, inhale its sweetness, or savor a crisp, white Sancerre. I will never slip into a hot lavender Epsom salt bath after a beach run, listening to La Vie en Rose as the world softens around me.

Death whispers, “never again,” and the whisper makes me dizzy.

Philosophers remind me that I am not alone in this terror and search for meaning in uncertainty. Heidegger would call this nausea the price of being human because only we live in full awareness of our “being-towards-death.” Death doesn’t wait politely at the end of life; it walks with us daily, shaping how we live if we dare to look. Albert Camus calls this clash the Absurd—the conflict between our craving for meaning and the universe’s indifference. He challenges me to imagine the Greek king of Corinth, Sisyphus smiling, reminding me to embrace the absurdity, despair and the climb, because the boulder always rolls back down – its inevitable. Oh, how I wish these wise sages were here now, and we could talk about what they have seen on the other side, if there is one. Is it all meaningless?

Psychologists have added another layer to their efforts to ease the uncertainty of the mind. Viktor Frankl, who survived the concentration camps, wrote that life’s ultimate freedom is the ability to find meaning even in suffering. Perhaps my nausea is not only a fear of disappearing but also a fear of not having mattered enough before I go. Frankl would urge me to turn that fear into fuel; to write, to love, to contribute, to plant even the smallest seed that whispers, “I was here.”

And then there is the spiritual current, the one that softens the hard edges. The Buddhists remind me that impermanence is the only constant, that every breath is a tiny death followed by renewal. The mystics speak of returning to the source, like a wave folding back into the sea. The Christian voice in me hears promise in the word resurrection. These perspectives offer not erasure but transformation. Therefore, the idea of death becomes less a void and more a passage, a shift into a form I cannot yet imagine.

I can’t pretend these thoughts always bring me comfort. Some nights, the nausea still grips me, and I wrestle with the “never again” feeling of it all. But in quieter moments, I realize that the unease is also a guide. It pushes me to live authentically, to find meaning in the time I have, and to trust in something greater than myself. I will continue to live life fully and have no regrets; speak my truth, spend time with those who see and acknowledge me, and, most importantly, surround myself with people who make me feel happy when I part ways with them.

Perhaps grief and the fear of death are not enemies but guides. They remind me: yes, I will be gone someday, but I am here now. And in this moment — soaking up the sunset, holding hands, laughing, tasting, traveling, listening, choosing joy, I am anything but obsolete.

So, I will raise my glass of Sancerre, breathe in the candle’s flame, and live shamelessly large—until the day I can’t. And off I go to Paris, to work on another project, and to claim a little me time in the city of light that reminds me how truly alive I am.